MIDLAND, Texas — The Young Women's Leadership Academy held its 1882 Governing Board meeting on Thursday morning and heard from a number of concern community members about the future of athletics for the school's student athletes.
In the past, student that wanted to compete in high school sports under the University Interscholastic League (UIL), they could do so with a home school, like Midland High or Midland Legacy, within Midland ISD.
This is changing next year. The deal between the school district and YWLA is set to be amended, student athletes will have to play sports at the school they attend. As a result, YWLA is set to start its own athletic department next school year.
During Thursday's meeting, parents, student athletes, and community members stepped up to the podium to give their personal statements. Many were concerned about the school's ability to start and launch an athletics program in a year. Questions were raised about the plan and budget for facilities.
The student athletes read personal statements on how this change will affect their ability to compete.
"The sports that want to be here should be able to as long as long as they are able to within UIL, and be able to competitively within UIL. For tennis that's not an option, so I'm hoping, at least for tennis, or sports similar to tennis where you have to have guys, that it becomes a possibility for us to continue to go and play for home campuses," YWLA student and Midland High varsity tennis player Lorelei Parrish said.
These athletes also want to continue to have the chance to compete at the 6a level, where they are more likely to gain exposure for college in order to pursue a collegiate career if they'd like to.
"I think part of it the choice between Midland High and YWLA. The fact that we may have to make that choice is really hard. Just think about that...it's just...I don't want to lose either. This is, I said it in my speech, this is exactly where I want to be," Parrish said.
The biggest concern for these student athletes was the fact that they didn't want to end up choosing between the school they love and the chance to compete at a high level.
"Not being able to play with the teammates that I've already grown really close to within the few months that we've known each other and been able to play. It was really emotional for me because of that," Nodolf said.
The Young Women's Leadership Academy 1882 Governing Board members were unable to comment on this issue since it wasn't an official agenda item. This now heads to the MISD board. NewsWest 9 reached out to the school district and is awaiting a statement.