In an impassioned plea to the members of the Floyd County Board of Education, student athletes from Betsy Layne High School petitioned the board members to reconsider a policy prohibiting school administrators to serve as coaches, sponsors and volunteers to the county's school athletic teams.

Brennan Case, student representative to the board at Monday's meeting, left his place at the board table to add his voice to the concerns in regard to the policy. "Pay attention to your motto," he pleaded, "put children first. Please, let us keep our coach...in case you don't know it, Brent Rose can multi-task," Case commented in a light-hearted moment. Rose, assistant principal of BLHS, has served in a variety of coaching positions with county schools throughout his career, including during his term as assistant principal.

The policy in question, granted final approval by the board in a meeting held last week, states that "district department heads, school principals, and assistant principals shall not serve as coaches, assistants or volunteers for any school based extra-curricular or co-curricular teams or squads, including, but not limited to, athletic and academic teams, cheerleading, and dance squads."

Board members have said that their support of the policy is in regard to a belief that school administrators in key positions should exercise their concentration and energies toward the "maintenance of an effective learning environment." However, board members Carol Stumbo and Linda Gearheart have voiced opposition to the policy in past meetings.

At Monday night's meeting, Stumbo put a motion on the table to reconsider a revision, or rescission, of the policy. The motion, however, died for lack of a second.

Also speaking in regard to the policy was BLHS Principal Sean Ousley who said that he believed that "not enough thought has been put into this policy." "I don't think the board has really considered how this policy is going to impact students...this policy did not go through as lengthy a process before final consideration as has been done with other policies," he said.

Ousley said that he felt that the policy infringed upon the authority of school administrators to evaluate their own personnel. "What you are doing with this policy, in effect, is micro-managing," he told the board. "It is my responsibility as a school personnel evaluator to determine whether or not a coach or administrator can do their job."

Ousley also pointed out to board members that he felt that "having a valued administrator present at away games" was a positive influence and safety net for both students and parents.

Rose also addressed the board, becoming emotional while doing so, as a result of "seeing these students stand up for something they love and believe in."

"I love coaching," Rose said. "Parents often ask school administrators to step in and help out (with athletic teams), now the administrators can't do that...But, I can say, that when my kids are out there, I'm going to volunteer and I don't care what kind of policy this board's got."

Betsy Layne student Case, in his plea to the board, reminded them that "this policy is affecting my team, my school, and my community, as well as other communities...take into consideration our opinions and put students first."

Carol Stumbo praised the students for doing "an excellent job" in addressing the board as well as offering praise to Betsy Layne administrators for leading by example.

"That's what we do at Betsy Layne," Ousley said. "We prepare our students to present themselves in a manner that's acceptable and dignified...I couldn't sit back there and do my students an injustice by letting them speak for me. That's why I had to say something myself."