Farmington’s move from Missota will wait at least a few weeks

Talk about it

The Farmington School Board will wait a few more weeks before deciding whether to leave the Missota Conference behind.

School board members voted Monday to wait until their Jan. 28 meeting to act on a proposal to leave the Missota, home since 1998 to Farmington High School’s sports teams, and join the South Suburban Conference. The unanimous decision came after board member Julie Singewald raised concerns about voting on the matter at a meeting billed as a workshop. She said she had told some parents who raised concerns about the move to come to the board’s Jan. 28 meeting, which is when she expected the decision to be made.

Singewald raised some concerns of her own regarding what the move to the South Suburban would mean for the ability of FHS athletic teams to compete. At 1,883 students, Farmington currently has the second biggest enrollment in the Missota but just the fifth-largest current enrollment among South Suburban Conference schools.

“We’re going to be kind of the small fish in the big pond,” Singewald said, raising concerns about what a lack of success in the win-loss column could mean for participation numbers. “It’s hard for those kids to keep coming back and playing really hard when they know they’re going to lose.”

Farmington High School athletic director Jon Summer suggested Monday there are benefits to athletic participation that go beyond winning and losing.

“You can learn a lot in a losing season,” he said. “It needs to be about how we help teammates succeed.”

Summer laid out reasons behind the proposed change at Monday’s meeting. FHS enrollment is growing, and Summer said the school is starting to look more like the schools in the bigger suburban districts. The move would also mean some savings when it comes to getting to games. The average one-way trip to a South Suburban Conference school would be 12.6 miles, less than half the 27-mile average trip to Missota Conference schools.

Summer said there is also some concern the Missota might not be around much longer no matter what Farmington does. He said discussion about joining the South Suburban Conference started after Chaska and Chanhassen, which joined the Missota three years ago, raised the possibility with Farmington of leaving the conference. With those schools looking for a better fit – they are more than 65 miles from Missota member Red Wing – Summer said the conference’s future was starting to look uncertain.

Summer did not expect the school board’s delay to have an impact on the proposed move.

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