School sporting scholarships/recruitment

[observer]

In line with Scarfman's guidelines I have created this thread.

I am very interested in this topic as I have always been of the view that schools should offer the talented sportsperson a scholarship. If they can offer scholarships for the talented musician and talented academic why not the talented sportsman?

I was not educated at a GPS school nor have any of my children. I went to an ISA school so my comments cannot be confused with parochialism.

Sport is part of the Aussie make-up just as much as academic and other cultural successes so I believe talented rugby players should get a shot at attending a GPS school for their all round development.

Durkadurka posted this this morning;

aagps.nsw.edu.au:
Code of Practice
In the light of these principles, the GPS Headmasters affirm the following code of practice:

No inducements such as sporting scholarships, whether direct, disguised, or at arm's length, shall be offered by any member school. Financial assistance to talented sportsmen shall not form part of the enrolment strategy of any member school.

In this vein it appears some GPS schools are defying the code of practice. So I ask these questions;

1. Which schools appear to be defying the code?

2. Are sanctions in place for schools that have defied the code?

3. Are scholarships providing some schools an unfair advantage on the rugby field?

4. Should the code be amended in light of so many schools defying the code and bring it into line with what is really happening today?

Please heed Scarfman's advice when commenting on this topic;

"However, people entering the debate should be VERY careful to remain open and curious, and not simply biased in favour of their own school. And of course, to keep the issue of race out of it wherever possible."

 

[googler]

i think this thread is just asking for trouble

obviously the rules need to be amended as they arent being followed by anyone and there is no1 to enforce such rules.

I love it how as soon as an outsider wins the premiership this talk starts.

 

[The Blindside]

I don't have any issue with discussing this topic. What I do have issue with is comments such as "Newington's Tongan Imports" and the very obvious racist overtones of the comments. Why is there any presumption that pacific islanders are on scholarship and not paying fees. In 2010 we should not be condoning this sort of racial sterotype. Joeys and Riverview have suffered for years with similar racist comments about their indigenous programs when the fact is only a very small percentage of the indigenous boys played 1st's. Newington also has an indigenous program and none of those boys playing A team football.

 

[Thismybrotha]

There are several reasons I think why Newington's win has sparked a hot topic

1. Firstly the already mentioned fact that they are not the usual contenders
2. The school as a whole does not do particularly well, so much so that most teams have to play teams below them (eg New 3rds vs other schools 4ths)
3. The 2nds haven't performed too well this year, especially in comparison to their 1sts

I think it is especially amplified by the fact that New gave Joeys a hiding in the 1sts, but Joeys 2nds gave New a hiding.

These don't reflect my own opinion, but I believe these are the main reasons why this topic has suddenly popped up.

 

[baldingwingforward]

The problem of Sports Scholarships will never go away. Regardless of what the GPS code of practice says "some" schools still brazenly recruit players, it is just that some schools are better at it than others.

Newington have been the best team this year. Congratulations to them. Regardless of the result next weekend they have been the best team and deserve it. Would they have won without the scholarship boys?? I doubt it. Apo and Luani are the backbone of the team. Yes the other boys are good (and before anyone jumps down my throat that they are all home grown i know that!), BUT they would not be anywhere near as good without the go forward from Luani and the steadying influence of Apo. The spine of a team is crucial, i.e. 2, 8, 9, 10, 15. Roach is a workhorse (yes he's home grown i know) and very physical to boot. Luani is the best in the team in imo, and Apo plays more like a 10 for New as most of the play comes off him and he does the tactical kicking. 15 is also a good player as well. Take 8 and 12 away and all of a sudden the team would not function as well.

As to the whole scholarship arguement - the Sydney GPS schools should follow their QLD counterparts. A few years ago TSS challenged the no scholarship rule in court as a restriction on fair trading... and they won. This has resulted in scholarships now being very open in QLD. This is better than all of the accusations and innuendo that get thrown around in the Sydney GPS comp.

Joeys and Riverview often get talked up as culprits... Infact the worst repeat offenders are Kings, Newington and Scots.

I don't argue with boys getting a good education because they are good at sport (rugby). Schools should just be more open about it instead of all of the bs that exists. At the moment the GPS is not a level playing field - the 3 schools i have mentioned above have a distinct advantage. However whether they can build a "team" from individual players isn't always the case. Kings should have won the GPS easily this year, yet they lost to Joeys, who realistically are one of the weaker teams this year. Talented players is one part of it - building desire and team culture is much harder....

 

[googler]

That is fair enough .. but if you look back at newington rugby history the 1sts have always been there or there abouts with the rest of the opens struggling behind.
To state the honest facts:

1 islander player yesterday is on a talented player scheme that is Apo.

Allan came to the school in year 8 because his brother came to the school, both boys paying full fees.

Joel luani came to the skool in year 10 paying full fees

Ezra came in year 9 paying full fees.

I know these boys personally and i can assure that there has not been a sudden influx of islanders to newington. Newington has had long standing relationship with Tonga, Newington is where Tongan royalty to this day are educated.

Anyway that has followed the progretion of Newington rugby would know that there has not been a sudden jump of rugby but a solid and steady improvement. Last year Newington lost 3 close games to scots, iggies and joeys all by 1 point.

Newingtons dominant form this year is mainly due to to the culture of success instilled into Newington over the past years. It is also down to the dominance of the year 11 and 10 group who have gone through the younger grades undeafeted.

So again i say that this forum is for little minded people that dont bother to read into the history of past seasons and as such simply blame success on cheating, which as a Newingtonian i find completely disrespectfull to the boys and it saddens me deeply that our first premiership in 30 odd years has been tinged with doubt and animosity. Its disgracefull

 

[Bandito]

That is fair enough .. but if you look back at newington rugby history the 1sts have always been there or there abouts with the rest of the opens struggling behind.
To state the honest facts:

1 islander player yesterday is on a talented player scheme that is Apo.

Allan came to the school in year 8 because his brother came to the school, both boys paying full fees.

Joel luani came to the skool in year 10 paying full fees

Ezra came in year 9 paying full fees.

I know these boys personally and i can assure that there has not been a sudden influx of islanders to newington. Newington has had long standing relationship with Tonga, Newington is where Tongan royalty to this day are educated.

Anyway that has followed the progretion of Newington rugby would know that there has not been a sudden jump of rugby but a solid and steady improvement. Last year Newington lost 3 close games to scots, iggies and joeys all by 1 point.

Newingtons dominant form this year is mainly due to to the culture of success instilled into Newington over the past years. It is also down to the dominance of the year 11 and 10 group who have gone through the younger grades undeafeted.

So again i say that this forum is for little minded people that dont bother to read into the history of past seasons and as such simply blame success on cheating, which as a Newingtonian i find completely disrespectfull to the boys and it saddens me deeply that our first premiership in 30 odd years has been tinged with doubt and animosity. Its disgracefull

You need to remember that Joel is the son of an Old Boy. His father Peter Luani played for the 1st's in 73 and 74 and his uncle John Luani played for the 1st's and NSW in 76 and 77. Please also remember that was no superstar when he started at Newington in Year 10 - he was only a reserve for GPS 3rd's last year. His development is solely due to he efforts of Brad Gill and Andrew Hill and all he coaching staff at New.

 

[googler]

You need to remember that Joel is the son of an Old Boy. His father Peter Luani played for the 1st's in 73 and 74 and his uncle John Luani played for the 1st's and NSW in 76 and 77. Please also remember that was no superstar when he started at Newington in Year 10 - he was only a reserve for GPS 3rd's last year. His development is solely due to he efforts of Brad Gill and Andrew Hill and all he coaching staff at New.

could not agree more. That is why i have a problem with this type of forum. It takes away from the extreme hard work done by the boys and the coaches ... respect MUST be given and shown

 

[Scarfman]

I think we can all agree that the boys who played Joeys yesterday deserved their win. It doesn't matter who they are or what their ethnicity is, they must have played some astonishing rugby. That's great news for Australian rugby.

For myself, as a CHS boy, I care who wins the Waratah Shield but don't care at all who wins the GPS comp. Having said that, it's kind of interesting to see Newington win, given that most people were tipping Kings.

There's a few issues here. (1) Should sporting scholarships be allowed? Feel free to express any opinion on that matter. What has the QLD experience been like? I know some BGS people who are resentful at how much money Churchie seem to throw at rugby.

(2) Are some GPS schools breaking their own code of conduct? If so, I think any reasonable evidence should be submitted here. For example - Newington seems to have a relationship with Tonga. For how long? Are all these sialdner boys Tongan, or has it become the private school of choice for well-off Pacific-Australian families? On the other hand, why does googler say that Apo is on a "talented player scheme"?

(3) This isn't just about Newington - what is the evidence for sporting scholarships at Kings, Joeys, Riverview?

 

[blackandwhite]

I think we can all agree that the boys who played Joeys yesterday deserved their win. It doesn't matter who they are or what their ethnicity is, they must have played some astonishing rugby. That's great news for Australian rugby.

For myself, as a CHS boy, I care who wins the Waratah Shield but don't care at all who wins the GPS comp. Having said that, it's kind of interesting to see Newington win, given that most people were tipping Kings.

There's a few issues here. (1) Should sporting scholarships be allowed? Feel free to express any opinion on that matter

(2) Are some GPS schools breaking their own code of conduct? If so, I think any reasonable evidence should be submitted here. For example - Newington seems to have a relationship with Tonga. For how long? Are all these sialdner boys Tongan, or has it become the private school of choice for well-off Pacific-Australian families? On the other hand, why does googler say that Apo is on a "talented player scheme"?

(3) This isn't just about Newington - what is the evidence for sporting scholarships at Kings, Joeys, Riverview?

Newington have been targeted because of a combination of sour grapes and racism. Every critiscm of "imports" at Newington is prefaced by the words "Tongan" or "Islander". Pacific Islanders have attended Newington since the 1890's (yes - 120 years). From Molitani Finau in the 1899 First XV, to the Samoan Prince who played 5 years in the 1st's in the 1950's, to Steve Finau in the 1960's, Peter and John Luani in the 1970's, Joe Cacabau in the 1980's just to name a few. The reason they come is that Newington is a methodist school and the Pacific Islanders are all methodists.

If Newington really wanted to win the premiership at all costs they would have kept Keliti Vaingolo on for one more year (he is still young enough for schoolboy rugby) and would have given a very well known representative back a scholarship when his father came knocking.

 

[Thismybrotha]

Since when does associating a race with being good at rugby constitute racism? I'd take that as a compliment.

 

[blackandwhite]

It's because they say things like "Newington only won because of their Tongan imports" just as they used to say "Joeys only win because of their aboriginal imports". Scots and Shore and Kings never get targeted in the same way because they field predominantly caucasian teams.

 

[Bowside]

There was alot of talk about this in the QLD this season, and the courier mail even ran the story on there front page for about 3 days.

There is so many different angles and arguements that can be made. At the end of the day, it comes down to the fact rugby is run so poorly in this country that players have to be in the gps system in order to make it further in rugby.

What the ARU need to do is give every kid the opportunity to play rugby at a decent standard, regardless of whether they go to nudgee, tss or logan state high. If you limit the amount of kids leaving state high schools to play in the GPS, and instead have them playing for there school, whilst also offering them a spot in either a local premier club training squad, or an ARU run training squad (like nts), then naturally the standard of non-GPS (and club) rugby would rise.

In terms of GPS I think the ideal system is one in which you cap the number of schollarships to maybe 2 per grade per school, and make the school offer them before the grade 10 rugby season. That way the kid isnt just there for rugby, but he has a decent shot at a good O.P./HSC. We currently have a situation in qld where nudgee (maybe tss?), bring blokes in to play 1 year in the first 15. Thats where I think it starts to border on cheating.

If you were to put my system in place, there would not be such a noticable gap between the standard of the "Big 3" and that of the other strong rugby schools like churchie and terrace.

 

[supporter]

(3) This isn't just about Newington - what is the evidence for sporting scholarships at Kings, Joeys, Riverview?

------------

There's a tongan boy (imort from Tonga) on scholarship for Joeys playing under 15. He was injured in his first game. Thanks Joeys for giving him to opportunity to study and play rugby.

 

[Scarfman]

Since when does associating a race with being good at rugby constitute racism? I'd take that as a compliment.

Mate, I haven't got time to go through the history of racism with you. Let's keep the discussion to evidence of GPS schools offering scholarships, and whether or not we agree with it.

 

[Scarfman]

OK supporter - Joeys has a Tongan boy on a scholarship. Did he come straight from Tonga in Year 8? Or was he born here and has Tongan parents?

 

[observer]

As to the whole scholarship arguement - the Sydney GPS schools should follow their QLD counterparts. A few years ago TSS challenged the no scholarship rule in court as a restriction on fair trading... and they won. This has resulted in scholarships now being very open in QLD. This is better than all of the accusations and innuendo that get thrown around in the Sydney GPS comp.

This is very interesting about TSS challenging the system. They probably did so because Nudgee and others were supplying scholarships and creating an uneven playing field.

It seems to me that having the Code of Practice as it currently stands brings no credit on the AAGPS because schools are defying it. It is a sham and should be amended. Come on GPS Principals - get fair dinkum!

 

[Scarfman]

Well, that's shamateur sport for you. Same with rugby in the 1980s and early 1990s, and same in the Olympics for a very long time.

I'm not sure the QLD experiment has gone that well, and it's a bloody big ship to turn around. I think they're stuck with sporting scholarships now whether they like it or not. Perhaps they should go the other way, and appoint an independent auditor of this rule?

 

[Bowside]

It saddens me that we need an independent auditor for schoolboy footy.

 

[Scarfman]

Yeah, I tend to agree. I would have thought that the point of schoolboy rugby is to help develop the man. Not to win at all costs.