“As soon as something goes wrong, they’re going to want to be homeschooled,” board member Denise Hoffstatter said during a school board meeting early this summer, while school instructional specifics were still pending. As of the August school board meeting, just 16 students from four families had chosen the homeschooling option, thereby re-embracing an old norm prior to state-provided public instruction. Meanwhile for the Stanley-Boyd district more generally, it was kickoff time: Sports are officially on this fall, at least for the time being. Among the restrictions to make a fall sports season possible are that indoor sports like volleyball can have only 15 people inside and so will be livestreamed with no spectators allowed, while outdoor sports have a limit of 50 people maximum— including players.

“At this time, we’re not allowing spectators,” S-B district superintendent Jeff Koenig said, going on to say that the Conference had said it would follow all county guidelines, and that Clark County deferred to Chippewa for those parts of the local district within Clark County. Sports were about more than competition however.

“The thing is, if we don’t offer stuff, someone else will. And if we can do it in a safe way, that’s what we should be doing,” Koenig told the school board at the August 24 meeting in the high school library. Koenig said that with the exception of football, a seven game season had already been approved, along with a shortened winter season. For Cross-Country, competition was limited to three teams at an individual meet, and together with Girls’ Golf has already been holding events.

As to football, there will be games at Oriole Field, but with

Staff photo.

just 50 people maximum including players, with action being livestreamed to those who couldn’t be present. “In my understanding, that’s the teams as well,” Koenig said of the 50-person limit, as he noted that otherwise ordinary football games can often have more than 50 fans just on one sideline. “Hopefully at some time we’ll be able to open to spectators, but right now we can’t.” Chad Verbeten raised an objection.

“I struggle with that,” he said of game capacity limits set by the state health department. “Because the same health department has guidelines that a Walmart can be 50 percent capacity.”

Koenig acknowledged Verbeten’s frustration, but said that the difference between sports and shopping was a matter of shop talk time.

“The difference between this and Walmart is that people don’t generally stop and talk at Walmart,” he said in reference to the 15minute window considered to be “exposure” time for COVID-19. On-site event fees would be used to hire bench workers. From talk of limits on the number of game spectators, the board turned next to event livestreaming options. There was no cost for YouTube, though other services did incur a fee to customers.

“I think whatever we choose should be free,” Lance Carlson said of ways for off-site viewers to get involved and cheer the athletes on. Discussion of district pay rates for the videographer came up next.

For students, the pay rate was $9.00 per game, but with “many jobs” paying $15 per hour and events like wrestling potentially taking a whole eight-hour workday, it wasn’t likely that $9.00 per game would attract many takers. Still, not all the official district pay rates were set so low.

A head ticket taker at a game could make $10.75 per hour, while a volleyball line judge could make $20.50 for a match with two out of three games, the pay rate bumped up to $22.50 if the volleyball match extended to three out of five games, with $30 for a regional match. A football announcer, meanwhile, could make $32.50 per game, and a timing operator could make $300 per game. Buddy, can you spare a minute? Even with work opportunities through sports, there was still some palpable frustration.

“When is this going to change?” Verbeten asked.

“When this is over,” Koenig said of the pandemic. With a motion by Carlson seconded by Jeff Boie, it was full speed ahead for 2020 fall sports at Stanley-Boyd.

Oriole Park will be open soon, but don’t expect to be in attendance for Stanley-Boyd football games this fall. Attendance is limited greatly, and arrangements are being made to have games streamed over the internet.