Contact: Geoff Kimmerly
517.332.5046 or [email protected]
EAST LANSING, Mich. – Aug. 6 – The annual Michigan High School Athletic Association participation fee survey saw record response for the 2024-25 school year and revealed good news as the percentage of member high schools charging student-athletes to play sports remained consistent with lowered post-pandemic levels.
Of the 720 schools (95 percent of membership) which responded to the most recent survey, only 40 percent of MHSAA member high schools (286) charged participation fees in 2024-25 – consistent with the rates between 40-41 percent revealed annually by the survey the previous four school years after the COVID-19 pandemic struck during the late winter and spring of 2020. Prior to the pandemic, a high of 57 percent of member schools charged participation fees in 2013-14, and 48 percent of high schools required pay-to-play in 2019-20.
The MHSAA began conducting the participation fee survey with the 2003-04 school year. For the purposes of the survey, a participation fee is anything $20 or more regardless of what the school called the charge – registration fee, athletic fee, etc.
Class A schools, as has been the trend, made up the largest group charging fees in 2024-25, with 53 percent of respondents doing so. Class B schools followed, with 40 percent charging fees, while 34 percent of Class C schools and 32 percent of Class D schools also charged for participation.
A standardized fee for each team on which a student-athlete participates – regardless of the number of teams – has remained the norm over the history of the MHSAA’s survey, and 43 percent of schools charging a fee during 2024-25 did so in this way. That was followed by 34 percent of responding schools charging a one-time standardized fee and 17 percent assessing fees based on tiers of the number of sports a student-athlete plays (for example, charging a larger fee for the first team and less for additional sports).
For 2024-25, the median maximum amount a school charged per student-athlete for the school year was $150, and the median annual maximum charged per family was $370. For schools charging student-athletes a one-time fee to cover all sports played, the median was $125. For schools charging a fee per sport, the median was $100 for each team.
The survey for 2024-25 and surveys from previous years can be found on the MHSAA Website at www.mhsaa.com by clicking on Schools – Administrators – Pay-To-Play Survey (direct link to this year’s results: https://www.mhsaa.com/sites/default/files/2025-08/24-25FeeSurveyResultsSeniorHigh.pdf).
The MHSAA is a private, not-for-profit corporation of voluntary membership by more than 1,500 public and private senior high schools and junior high/middle schools which exists to develop common rules for athletic eligibility and competition. No government funds or tax dollars support the MHSAA, which was the first such association nationally to not accept membership dues or tournament entry fees from schools. Member schools which enforce these rules are permitted to participate in MHSAA tournaments, which attract more than 1.3 million spectators each year.
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