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Arkansas Activities Association "Open to Anything" to make sports happen

Earlier this week the Arkansas Activities Association released a statement saying that they are preparing to resume sports this fall. There are still a lot of questions on the table regarding numbers for the COVID-19 pandemic and if Governor Asa Hutchinson and the Department of Health will allow sports.

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However, Arkansas Activities Association Executive Director Lance Taylor said the Association wants to do all they can do to make sure student-athletes are allowed to participate in activities if in-class teaching resumes this fall.

“We meet with the state about three times per week,” said Taylor. “They are talking about starting school and we want kids to be able to enjoy their childhood, and that includes activities. They have been disrupted, and I hate that for all of the kids in this state and all states because it’s been in every state. So, if we can return to school we are going to try to do all that we can to first of all make sure they are safe, and second of all to offer all of the activities that they want to participate in in their childhood years. That has kind of been taken away from them right now, and we sure do want to give that back to them.”

There have been rumors regarding some states looking at moving spring sports to the fall and fall sports to the spring. This would put sports like baseball, softball, and track in the fall while football would be played in the spring.

Despite rumors on the internet of this potentially happening, Taylor said none of the associations in any state has moved to do this, but the Arkansas Activities Association is “open to anything” in order to try to make sports happen.

“We are open to anything,” Taylor said. “That is kind of like a rumor out there. I got on a conference on Zoom with all 50 state executive directors the other day and nobody is planning on that. Everybody is having those discussions in case something happens, but nobody has planned for that right now. For some reason that is a big rumor that is getting circulated and that is not the case right now. Now, if something changes and things get worse, we are open to anything we can to be able to provide activities to our kids. We are all in the same boat and we are all going to have to be very flexible because at any given moment it can change, and we all understand that.”

Taylor said that his office has received positive feedback in regards to the drills that student-athletes have been able to participate in this summer since workouts were permitted by Governor Hutchinson and the Department of Health, and coaches have done “a great job” of making sure guidelines have been followed.

“We are seeing that the coaches have done a great job,” Taylor said. “I’m going to be honest with you – I think kids are safer at school when there is someone there monitoring them, but when they leave school and they all go out together and they all hang out and they all run around at night, I think that is probably more scary than when they are at school and being supervised, when they are being social distanced, when they are having to wear their mask when they can. I think they are probably more safe at school than they are anywhere else right now besides the ones that may be quarantined in their house.”

Taylor said there has been a high number of student-athletes participating in the summer workouts.

“We have had high numbers. All of the schools I have talked to have had high participation numbers from 85 percent or more of their kids coming back and working out and everything,” Taylor said. “We’ve got some schools that are at 100 percent. I think the kids want these childhood memories and they want to get back and enjoy their childhood years, and that includes activities.”

Taylor also said that coaches are wanting clearance to do inner-squad scrimmage’s and 7-on-7 work, and he hopes clearance will be given to do that soon.

“We visit with the Governor’s office and Department of Health probably two or three times per week and they have been great to us and communicating with us,” Taylor said. “Nothing has changed much lately because the numbers have started going up a little bit, so we didn’t move on to anything with close contact. A lot of coaches out there are wanting to at least have inner-squad scrimmages or play 7-on-7. Just something to give them repetition or to run through their offenses, just something like that. They just don’t think it is safe yet for the kids to do that, and they haven’t released us, so we haven’t done that. I know conditioning and weightlifting gets a little old for the kids, but they’re resilient – that’s a good thing – and they’ll adjust. But hopefully we will get to do that here shortly.”

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