R&R Adds New Feature — Interactive Maps
By Jeanne Acton, UIL Journalism Director | Tuesday, February 07, 2012 8:21 AM
After the release of the 2012-14 Reclassification and Realignment, Dr. Mark Cousins, the athletic director, gives an interview to a local cable news station. The maps that the staff creates for each district within a conference stand in the background.
Photo by Jeanne Acton
For Athletic Director Mark Cousins, the 2012-14 Football and Basketball Reclassification and Realignment process was much the same as previous years.
He and his colleagues spent many long days and late nights working with enrollment figures trying to get the most equitable conferences and districts for 1,300 plus high schools in a state that spans more than 265,000 square miles. And while some still don’t believe it, he still used more than 1300 blue push pins and more than 250 orange rubber bands to paint the visual picture of each district.
“It’s a difficult balancing act,” Dr. Cousins said. “We try to limit travel and keep the most equity in the districts that we can.”
But not everything was the same as years past. Dr. Cousins and his staff added a new feature this year to R&R — interactive maps of each district and conference. The maps will help the public see what the districts actually look like.
“It was the staff’s idea,” he said. “The maps show a really nice picture of the composition of the district and the geographic location of all the schools. This is the first time we have had the opportunity for the public to have a visual representation of the alignment.”
The link to the interactive maps is: http://uil-texas.net/php/dispatch.php?event=publish_reclass&first_time=init&pg=static_reclass_results.
Every two years, UIL goes through the Reclassification and Realignment process “to respond to growth or loss of student population and to allow for new schools to enter districts,” Dr. Cousins said.
It’s a long process that starts in early November after every Texas high school sends in its enrollment figures.
“We’ve been working pretty steady since November,” Dr. Cousins said. “We went to print last Thursday, but we were making changes as late as Wednesday afternoon.”
Similar to every year, some schools may see a change in their conference and/or district. For example, due to growth five-time football state champion Lake Travis High School in the Austin area moved from the 4A conference to 5A.
“When a school moves up a conference it, more than often not, is going to see the move as a challenge,” Cousins said. “But there really isn’t that much difference in the competition level of play between 4A and 5A.”
This year, Cousins said his staff again saw shifts in the demographics of Texas.
“We are seeing a lot of growth along and to the east of I-35,” he said. “And the suburban areas are continuing to grow.”
Dr. Cousins describes the R&R release day as an “exciting day.”
“It’s the end of a very long process,” he said. “And I know all of our stakeholders are very excited to see what their districts are going to look like.”
For a full list of districts and conferences for 2012-14, go to http://www.uiltexas.org/alignments