Interim report from 12-member Football Advisory Committee is due to be delivered during Monday’s special school board meeting.
By John Tredrea
An interim report from the 12-member Football Advisory Committee, formed last summer to evaluate the sport, is expected to delivered during Monday’s special school board meeting.
The session will be held at 7:30 p.m. in the Board Meeting Room, Administration Building, 425 S. Main St., Pennington.
The advisory committee was appointed shortly after Hopewell Valley’s first interscholastic high school football team since 1932 held its first practice.
The membership of the advisory committee was recommended to the board by schools Superintendent Robert Sopko. It includes one student, two high school faculty members, five parents (including a member of the pro-football group HIKE), a member of Pennington Borough Council, and four other residents, including an orthopedic surgeon.
The advisory committee has been assisting HoVal Athletic Director Kiki Enderle in evaluating football. School officials have termed the document expected to be presented Monday to the Hopewell Valley Board of Education as an interim report.
A final report is scheduled for delivery a year from now.
Under a resolution adopted unanimously by the school board last summer, criteria the committee was charged to use in evaluating football include:
The number of participants in football;
Its impact on existing sports programs;
Scholastic records of participants in football;
Injuries compared to other sports;
Effect on school/community spirit and morale;
Real costs of operating the program;
Expense of peripheral programs;
Community support;
Number of spectators;
Impact on the community;
And other criteria developed by the committee and approved by the superintendent.
The evaluation done by the advisory committee is expected to be a key factor in the district’s decision on whether to keep football after two seasons. HIKE has agreed to pay all costs of the sport for the first two seasons.
"We tried to get a broad representation of viewpoints on the advisory committee," Dr. Sopko said last summer when the committee was formed. "We wanted a group that would have a positive attitude and that would also ask probing questions."
The members of the advisory committee are: Kate Megna, a senior at Central High School and also the high school’s representative on the school board; high school faculty members William O’Brien and Anthony Suozzo; parents Ida Valcracel, Ona Rose (who is a member of the high school Booster Club); Kris Kley of HIKE, Judy Manley, and Nancy Ross, a member of the Pennington Borough Council. Also appointed to the committee were Warren C. Lewis, longtime athletic officer for Hopewell Valley American Legion Post 339; Dr. William Gomez, an orthopedic surgeon; Michael Kincaid and Jon Butler.

