RENTON, Wash. – The Washington Interscholastic Activities Associations (WIAA) Representative Assembly voted to pass 10 amendments for the 2017-18 school year, the Association announced Monday.
Six of the passed amendments apply to both middle level and high school programs. The first allows the WIAA Executive Board to approve All-State and/or All-America games in which WIAA coaches can coach. This is a change from the previous rule which stated approval must be granted by the Washington State Coaches Association.
A new amendment allows a host of a jamboree to contact the WIAA staff to restructure an event if a school withdraws within four days of the jamboree and a replacement cannot be found.
Another change put into place eliminates the requirement that an ejection appeal must be filed before the “next live ball” or resumption of play.
Additionally, coaches’ standards will now become task based as opposed to the current system based on clock hours.
The fifth change at both the high school and middle level requires that, for officials to be eligible for state tournaments, they must meet WOA objective criteria and training requirements. Officials fees for postseason play will be negotiated by the joint WIAA/WOA committee.
In soccer, with the exception of goalkeepers, a player who receives a yellow card will be required to leave the field and may be replaced. If a team with a cautioned player elects to play shorthanded, the player may not re-enter until the next legal substitution opportunity.
Two middle level amendments were passed, which allow an extra hitter to be added to the lineup in both softball and baseball.
Similarly, subvarsity high school teams will be able to teams will be able to add an extra hitter in baseball in softball lineups as well.
To see full text of the 10 passed amendments, CLICK HERE.
In addition to the passed amendments, the Representative Assembly approved three WIAA Executive Board Members. Harlan Kredit (Lynden Christian, District I), Tim Thomsen (Sumner, District 3) and Greg Whitmore (Lind-Ritzville, District 7) will begin a new term on the Board.
The Representative Assembly is comprised of 53 (35 high school, 18 middle level) school administrators from each of the nine WIAA districts. For an amendment to pass, 60 percent approval is needed from voting members of the Assembly.