Representatives from 15 small schools in Southwest Iowa met in Griswold Wednesday for a discussion on possible conference realignment.  The meeting was a discussion jumping off point for those schools that are interested in the possible benefits of forming a new conference.

Schools invited to the meeting were Southwest Valley, Griswold, Riverside, Clarinda Academy, East Mills, Sidney, Lenox, Bedford, Fremont-Mills, Audubon, CAM, Coon Rapids-Bayard, Exira-EHK, Essex, Stanton, Heartland Christian, and South Page.  Clarinda Academy and East Mills were the only two schools without representatives at the Wednesday meeting.

KJAN Sports spoke with Griswold Athletic Director Kevin Whitehill after the meeting and he said it was a positive meeting that was well attended.  He emphasized one of the major talking points was the educational aspect of starting a new conference in that schools of similar small size could potentially share teachers or other resources.

Whitehill also felt there could be benefit from the activities and athletics standpoint in having these similar sized schools joined together.  When asked if travel was a concern for any schools, Whitehill said that was something that was discussed but that could be helped out by the organization of the conference with the potential for divisions if enough schools are interested.  He thought it was a small concern for some schools but not something that was a prohibitive factor in his mind.

Fremont-Mills Athletic Director Jeremy Christiansen has been one of the leaders in this process and he will be the point-man for the next step. Whitehill said schools will now have time to consider a move with their school districts and then let Christiansen now if they want to continue to pursue a change by April 1st.

Whitehill said any changes that would be made wouldn’t happen until the 2017-2018 school year at the earliest.

You can listen to our full discussion with Mr. Whitehill below.

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