The OSSAA Debate: Reform, Replace, or Reconsider?

Recent comments by Governor Stitt have reignited conversation about whether the OSSAA should continue serving as the governing body of Oklahoma high school athletics.

It’s a fair question.

As someone who spent twelve years as an Athletic Director at multiple 6A schools — and who also served within the OSSAA structure, as President of the Oklahoma Interscholastic Athletic Administrators Association — I can tell you this:

Replacing a governing body is much easier to suggest than it is to execute.

We don’t have to look far for an example. The NCAA has faced court challenges, public criticism, and major rule changes in recent years. Yet despite rulings being overturned and policies evolving, the NCAA remains the governing body of intercollegiate athletics.

Why?

Because governance in sports is complicated.

High school athletics are no different — and in many ways, they’re more complex. When people think of the OSSAA, they often think about football, basketball, baseball, and soccer. But the association oversees far more than those headline sports. Pom. Cheer. Band. Speech and Debate. Academic competitions. Track. Wrestling. And many more.

Each activity requires rules, eligibility standards, classification systems, playoff structures, and dispute resolution processes. Ensuring competitive equity across urban and rural districts, large and small schools, public and private institutions — that is no small task.

That doesn’t mean the OSSAA is perfect.

Nearly everyone involved in high school athletics has a frustration to share: an eligibility ruling they disagreed with, a questionable officiating assignment, playoff seeding concerns, perceived geographic bias, or concerns about financial distribution. Criticism comes with the territory.

But it is also true that the OSSAA has made a multitude of efforts to adjust, listen, and improve. Like any governing body, it operates within constraints — legal, financial, and political.

There’s another reality we must acknowledge: while the right to an education is legally protected, the right to participate in athletics is not. In fact, it’s the opposite of protected, and not promised at all. This dynamic causes confusion amongst parents because sports are considered a privilege rather than a right.

In fact, athletics has been so separated from education that public education systems long ago chose to allow independent state athletic associations to oversee extracurricular competition. This was because the structure, compliance demands, and liability concerns are so extensive that State Boards of Education believed it was something they did not need to control.

Most states haven’t even updated their physical education curriculum in decades let alone given serious consideration to athletics. Yet we expect high school sports — which now operate in an era of social media, NIL discussions, transfer movement, and heightened legal scrutiny — to function seamlessly?

So before we rush toward cancellation, we should pause and ask a better question:

If not the OSSAA, then who?

Should legislators be responsible for drafting eligibility rules, setting playoff structures, adjudicating transfer disputes, and managing competitive balance?

How many policymakers have direct experience running athletic departments, navigating Title IX compliance, balancing rural-urban equity concerns or even being involved in sports?

Governance requires infrastructure. It requires institutional memory. It requires staff. It requires systems.

Reform may be necessary. Transparency can always improve. Communication can always strengthen.

But replacement is not as simple as dissatisfaction.

High school sports are hard. They sit at the intersection of education, community pride, adolescent development, and competitive ambition. No governing body will ever satisfy every stakeholder.

The real debate, then, may not be whether the OSSAA should exist — but how it should evolve.

Reform. Replace. Or reconsider.

Those are serious words.

They deserve serious thought.

Dr. Jason Parker and Dr. Juwan Parker are former high school All-Americans, Division I standout basketball players, attorneys, and founders of Parent Athlete Advocate. They help families navigate the high school athletic journey through intentional planning, mentorship, and consultation—so athletes are prepared for opportunity, not overwhelmed by it.