Encampment gets 6-man football

It was standing room only during the rescheduled meeting of the Carbon County School District (CCSD) No. 2 Board of Trustees at 4 p.m. on Nov. 13 at Encampment K-12 School as the board heard a presentation from Encampment students in regards to a proposal for a six-man football team next school year. The presentation, which lasted approximately 30 minutes, was lead by Koye Gilbert with occasional input by other students and staff members.

“I’m Koye Gilbert and on behalf of both the high school students and Encampment kids that go to school, I’d like to propose a six-man football league for Encampment school. There are plenty of kids in both junior high and high school to fill both teams,” began Gilbert.

Gilbert informed the board members that business and private individuals had already offered to donate to the program to ensure its funding and that the program was $6,000 short of its $22,000 goal. The donations made would go towards purchasing new gear for the football team as well as rehabilitation and maintenance of the field.

At a later point in the presentation, Gilbert confirmed coaches at Encampment K-12 School had volunteered their time to coach if the program were approved. According to the students, the only cost that they believed would have to be picked up by Carbon County School District No. 2 would be for the payment of referees for games.

When asked by board member Diana Berger if Encampment had the numbers to support the program for more than a year, Gilbert informed her that at least 18 high school students, excluding current seniors, were interested in joining as were 11 junior high students. Board member Paul Clark asked if, with the varsity schedule for next season already set, the upcoming seniors were comfortable with playing a full junior varsity (JV) schedule.

“Do you have seniors that wouldn’t letter next year that would be disappointed with that JV schedule?” added Kaycee Alameda

“I don’t think so because, the few seniors that will be playing next year just want to play football for Encampment right now. We want to play varsity schedule, but just getting a football team going for Encampment is really important,” Gilbert replied.

“I’ll be a senior next year and I really think it will just be a benefit to have the varsity schedule for the following year. It’s definitely a move to the future out of just one year,” added Reid Schroeder.

Further discussion between the board and CCSD No. 2 Superintendent Jim Copeland focused on the precedent that would be set by granting Encampment K-12 School a six-man football team. Board chairman Joe Gaspari added that he would like to delay any action until the meeting in December.

“The reason that I would like to delay action on this is, number one, all board members will have time to think this through which will enable us to make a good decision at the December board meeting,” said Gaspari. “This decision will have precedence on future requests of private funding of activities if this is a sustainable item without future costs to the district, and we will also have time to get feedback from all concerned parties. The feedback I have received has been mixed and good questions have been presented and I believe these need to be answered before we make a good decision.”

Duane Gilbert, assistant high school basketball coach for Encampment Tigers and Koye’s father, asked the board why they would delay action following a recommendation from the activities board, which originally heard the six-man football program proposal. Board member Georgia Miller asked D. Gilbert why he wanted to have a decision made at the November meeting, to which he stated that some of the businesses that were willing to donate were already doing their taxes and he was nervous of losing a year due to lack of donations in terms of tax write-offs for the larger businesses.

The motion was made, and seconded, with the language “to grant a six-man football program being fully funded by outside donations of money and/or time including all facilities and field improvements required with the exception of referee costs borne by the district, keeping in mind that the committee does not believe the district funding of new activities such as football is feasible at this time due to funding constraints. We do not support the addition of any activity on any campus that requires Carbon County School District No. 2 additional funding, however, in the case of the school and the community offering to fund the new activity with donations recommend a trial period be allowed of two years.”

Following the approval of the program, the rest of the meeting continued normally with the board bidding farewell to outgoing member Berger and welcoming new members Karen Condict and Charlie George and returning member Kassey Westring.

The next meeting of the CCSD No. 2 Board of Trustees will be at 4 p.m. on Dec. 17 at the Central Administration Office in Saratoga.