Retired AD Smith to Receive NFHS Honor
By
Geoff Kimmerly
MHSAA.com senior editor
November 26, 2019
Retired longtime athletic director Fred Smith has been selected to receive a Citation from the National Federation of State High School Associations during the 50th National Athletic Directors Conference sponsored by the NFHS and National Interscholastic Athletic Administrators Association (NIAAA) on Dec. 16 in National Harbor, Md.
NFHS Citations are presented annually to outstanding athletic directors in recognition of contributions to interscholastic athletics at the local, state and national levels. State associations nominate athletic directors for NFHS Citations, and the NFHS Board of Directors approves recipients.
A 1979 graduate of Western Michigan University, Smith began his career at St. Joseph Lake Michigan Catholic Schools, serving for 11 years. In 1991, he joined Comstock Public Schools, where he served for 16 years. Smith move to Buchanan Community Schools in 2007, where he remained until 2015 before departing for his final stop as athletic director at Benton Harbor for two years. He retired in 2017, serving 38 years total as a teacher, coach and administrator, and resides in Stevensville.
Among his accomplishments, Smith instituted awards programs to recognize three-sport (or more) student-athletes who participated for their full, four-year high school career. Additionally, he assisted with the development of an evaluation tool for coaches and helped provide funding for coaches to attend the MHSAA's Coaches Advancement Program.
Smith was a member of the MHSAA Representative Council from 2005 to 2017, including the final four years as vice president. He also served on several MHSAA committees, and he hosted countless MHSAA District and Regional tournaments. With the Michigan Interscholastic Athletic Administrators Association (MIAAA), he has served as chair of its Professional Development Committee as well as a member of its executive board from 1993 to 1998.
Smith was a member of the NIAAA Board of Directors (1996-98), Credentials Committee (1989-96) and Hall of Fame Screening Committee (2010-18). He has been heavily involved in the NIAAA’s Leadership Training Institute. He is national course chair for LTC 501, and he has presented Leadership Training Courses in 14 states. Smith also served on the NIAAA Executive Director Search Committee, and he has attended 34 National Athletic Directors Conferences.
Smith has been honored with numerous awards. He has previously received the NIAAA Distinguished Service Award, the NIAAA Thomas E. Frederick Award of Excellence, the NIAAA Frank Kovaleski Professional Development Award, and the MHSAA Charles E. Forsythe Award.
Michigan Again 7th for Participation
August 19, 2015
By Geoff Kimmerly
Second Half editor
For the seventh straight year, Michigan ranked seventh nationally in high school sports participation, according to statistics for the 2014-15 school year released recently by the National Federation of State High School Associations.
That level of participation continued to best Michigan’s national ranking for total number of residents of high school age, which remained ninth for the third consecutive year, and Michigan also ranked ninth or higher in participation in 25 of 28 sports in which the Michigan High School Athletic Association conducts a postseason tournament.
Michigan’s participation ranking was based on a number of 295,660, with 124,633 girls and 171,027 boys taking part, and included sports in which the MHSAA does not conduct postseason tournaments. The totals count students once for each sport in which he or she participates, meaning students who are multiple-sport athletes are counted more than once.
The state’s girls participation remained seventh nationally for the fourth consecutive year, while the boys participation figure continued to rank sixth. According to the latest U.S. Census Bureau figures from 2014, Michigan ranks ninth in both females and males ages 14 through 17.
Two sports improved in national ranking this school year, while four sports dropped one or two positions. However, 13 sports bested the state’s overall national participation ranking of seventh, placing sixth or higher on their respective lists.
Michigan girls volleyball improved from fifth to fourth in the national participation ranking, and girls track and field from eighth to seventh. The four sports that ranked lower for 2014-15 were boys bowling falling from second to third, girls cross country from fifth to seventh, girls swimming and diving from ninth to 10th and wrestling from seventh to eighth.
The 11 other Michigan sports that ranked sixth or higher repeated their rankings from a year ago: football (11 and 8-player combined) at sixth, boys basketball at sixth, boys golf at sixth, boys ice hockey fourth, boys skiing fourth, boys tennis fifth, girls bowling fourth, girls competitive cheer fifth, girls golf sixth, girls skiing fourth and girls tennis also remaining fourth on its national participation list.
The other Michigan sports that equaled their 2013-14 national ranking were girls basketball at seventh, gymnastics at 12th, girls lacrosse at 13th, girls soccer at ninth, softball at seventh, baseball at seventh, boys cross country also seventh, boys lacrosse eighth, boys soccer ninth, boys swimming and diving ninth and boys track and field seventh on its list.
National participation in high school sports in 2013-14 set a record for the 26th consecutive year with 7,807,047 participants – an increase of 11,389 from the year before. Girls participation also set a record for the 26th straight year, increasing this time 20,071 participants to 3,287,735 total. Boys participation fell 8,682 participants from 2013-14, but still totaled 4,519,312 after passing 4.5 million for the first time a year ago.
Boys soccer saw the largest gain nationally with an additional 15,150 participants, and that sport ranked fifth among boys sports behind 11-player football, outdoor track and field, basketball and baseball. Football (1,083,617) remained the most-played high school sport overall. Track and field remained the most popular girls sport with 478,726 participants, with volleyball moving ahead of basketball for the second spot in the girls rankings. Soccer and softball followed at fourth and fifth, respectively, on the girls sports list.