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Bottom line is its really a political topic. No child left behind has this whole $&@&ing country running in place while the rest of the world caught up and now working on lapping us

In 1994, BEN was the top seed in the district 6 playoffs. FH beat them in the 1st round at Bellwood-Antis' field. They sure as hell had more than 25 kids that night. They must have had TREMENDOUS athletes if they were a top seed playoff team in AA with only 25 kids? Was there NO competition up north that year?? Get me some proof that their roster was that small back in the mid-late 90's.

They did have some tremendous athletes... They owned d6 AA in wrestling for more than a couple years... Y do I have to prove squat to you? You are the one that started spouting of info.... 100 kids? Name the ones that didn't play. Oh wait that's something you'd say

fwiw, apparently extracurricular activites account for about 2% of a school districts expenses in PA. So athletics sure aren't the reason for budget issues and consolidation needs.

FYI,

I Looked on Maxpreps, Forest hills Roster size per year:

2005-58
2006-51
2007-42
2008-43
2009-39
2010-44
2011-47
2012-37
2013-50 (includes 13 Freshman, who until this year did not count in the roster size)

That is around 36% less players than 2005. From memory, FH used to have around the mid 50's for a long time prior to 2005. Point being, I think participation is down as a whole across the whole area. One could argue numbers are down because there are less students, but, at FH it is not to the tune of 36%.

Eaglealum: In spouting off info about 100 kids, I prefaced my statement with "I'll BET there were over 100 kids". You see, the "I'll bet" is far different from your, "they HAD". Therefore YOU have to prove YOUR facts, not me. And skippy, can you find out for us the total attendance for FH (10th -12th grades or just the senior class) in all of those years you just mentioned. And by the way, did you notice that if you throw out the highest and lowest numbers in your sample, that there is very little fluctuation in total numbers. Just thought I'd mention that. You can do wonderful things with statistics, especially percentages. Like odoyelrules just said, athletics isn't the reason for consolidation.

Also, can someone find me the football participation numbers for the present Ligonier Valley roster, and the roster numbers for the separate schools of Ligonier and Laurel Valley the year BEFORE the jointure.

2009 Laurel Valley 34
2009 Ligonier 35
2010 Ligonier Valley 49
2013 Ligonier Valley 44

All per MaxPreps

Thank you so much odoyelrules. In 5 years, the "greater" Ligonier Valley School system has gone from 69 kids on the separate football rosters of Ligonier and Laurel Valley, to 44 this year. Today there are 25 less football players in this area as there were before the jointure. I am convinced that there are fewer sports participants in schools that have combined, as there were as separate school districts. Sure the overall quality of play MIGHT be better, but there are definitely more kids NOT participating as in the past.

and remember, only this year's numbers listed in the previous post reflect freshmen being moved up...the other three years listed were just sophs to seniors....