Dateline: February 7, 2002

Clarendon, Hedley schools facing new districts next fall   

Clarendon ISD will be competing with schools closer to its size and closer to home for the next two years following a realignment by the University Interscholastic League in Austin. But Hedley ISD received the opposite news.

  The biennial UIL reclassifications were announced Monday at the Region 16 Service Center in Amarillo, and CISD will move from District 6-2A to District 3-1A for football and to District 2-1A for basketball.

“We’re real excited about the new district,” said CISD Superintendent Monty Hysinger. “It was the best case scenario for us.”

Hysinger was on hand for the announcement along with Athletic Director Roger Hoeltzel and CHS Principal Larry Jeffers.

Other schools in District 3-1A will be Claude, Shamrock, Memphis, Wellington, and Wheeler. The same schools make up District 2-1A for basketball.

Hysinger said the change in CISD’s status from 2A to 1A reflects a drop in local enrollment and an expansion of the cutoff for class 1A schools. In the last reclassification in 2000, CISD’s high school enrollment was 173 and the cutoff was 169. This year, the local high school has an enrollment of 145, and the cutoff is 179.

District wide enrollment has dropped from 535 in 1999 to 495 this year.

Hysinger said the new district should make Clarendon more competitive academically and athletically and will reduce the school’s transportation costs. Under the old district, Clarendon had to travel more than 110 miles for games in Spearman and Sunray. Now, the farthest competitor will be 70 miles away in Wheeler.

Clarendon school officials may be happy with their new UIL alignment, but Hedley ISD is less than enthusiastic about the news it received Monday.

Following Monday’s reclassification, Hedley finds itself facing competitors further away from home.

“Do you know where I can rent a plane?” Hedley Principal Terry Stevens asked.

HISD moves from to District 2-1A for six-man football, a district which includes Happy, Valley, Matador, Patton Springs, and Silverton. The school will be in District 4-1A for Division II basketball. That district is composed of Valley, Silverton, McLean, Samnorwood, and Groom.

Stevens said Hedley will have to travel more than 110 miles for two of its competitors – Patton Springs and Happy – where the old district was much closer to home.

“We would have liked to have been closer,” Stevens said, “but it’s just for two years. Then it will change again.”

Stevens said Hedley will be in a strong six-man football district with some larger schools and a strong boys basketball district with HHS graduating several seniors. But he expects the Hedley girls will continue to be the district leaders in basketball.

Enrollment for the Hedley Public Schools is currently at 187.

The UIL will solidify the new districts later this month. The realignments will take effect in the 2002-03 school year and last through the 2003-04 school year.