Academy students sue to play sports in McAllen
McALLEN – A Sharyland school bus arrives at McAllen’s Lamar Academy each day to pick up just one student.
David Santos – an enrollee in the McAllen school system’s International Baccalaureate program and a member of the Sharyland High School boys swim team – makes a four-mile trek between both campuses to practice for a school he doesn’t attend and with teammates he will never see in class.
It’s a trip the state body governing high school sports requires of Santos and dozens of students who attend charter schools and specialty campuses across the state if they want to compete in varsity athletics — but one Santos hopes will end this year.
Earlier this month, he and three other students enrolled in the McAllen academy filed suit against the University Interscholastic League seeking the opportunity to join sports teams for the traditional high schools in the McAllen district.
“If it’s football, if it’s tennis, if it’s golf, whatever it is,” said their attorney, Bobby Garcia. “They should be able to play sports in the district they attend.
Each of Garcia’s clients in the suit enrolled at Lamar to join the McAllen school district’s International Baccalaureate program, a rigorous academic curriculum designed to grant students a head start in college courses.
But the campus does not have a sports program.
The students argue they should be able to join teams at McAllen’s other three other high schools, but under UIL eligibility rules, only full-time students at any given campus are allowed to compete for that school.
Because Lamar draws teens from across the Rio Grande Valley, its enrollees would be attending different school districts had they chosen not to join IB.
UIL has traditionally accommodated those teens by allowing them to join athletic programs in their home school systems.
It’s the only fair way to ensure students do not choose particular charter or specialty schools as a way of picking the districts for which they want to compete, said Kevin Heyburn, an assistant Texas attorney general representing UIL in the suit, in court filings.
But for Santos, this set-up results in a daily schlep back and forth to Sharyland during the swim season.
Sharyland school district’s Athletics Director Richard Thompson, who supports the current UIL rules, said he’s happy to have Santos on the high school team.
Thompson said he has made accommodations like the daily bus rides to and from Lamar to make sure Santos has the opportunity to participate.
“We actually drive over and pick him up at the IB academy and take him to the Boys and Girls Club swimming pool where we practice,” he said. “We want him to compete for us because he lives in our attendance zone.”
Other teens haven’t been so lucky, Garcia said.
Danielle Garza, another Lamar student who has joined the lawsuit, wanted to participate in swimming only to learn that her home campus in the Pharr-San Juan-Alamo district doesn’t have a team.
Others have been turned away by home districts that don’t know them and don’t have records of their enrollment, the attorney said.
What’s more, the McAllen school system receives state and federal money to support these students – including their participation in extracurricular sports, Guerra said.
UIL is essentially requiring other districts to take in Lamar students at a financial loss to themselves, he argued.
“They’re saying to the IB students, if you want to play UIL sports you have to go back to the city that you live in,” he said. “But they’re not full-time students there either.”
None of the student plaintiffs were available for comment on the case under their attorney’s advice while the lawsuit remains pending.
A state district court judge is scheduled to take up the matter at a hearing this afternoon.
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Jeremy Roebuck covers courts and general assignments for The Monitor. You can reach him at (956) 587-9377.
