Survey Shows Small but Steady Rise of Multi-Sport Participation at MHSAA High Schools
By
Geoff Kimmerly
MHSAA.com senior editor
December 16, 2025
The Michigan High School Athletic Association’s seventh Multi-Sport Participation Survey, conducted last spring for the 2024-25 school year, showed small but continuing growth of multi-sport participation among athletes at member high schools.
The annual Multi-Sport Participation Survey was inspired by the MHSAA’s Task Force on Multi-Sport Participation, which was appointed in 2016 to study early and intense sport specialization – a serious issue related to health and safety at all levels of youth sports – and to promote multi-sport participation as a way to help stave off overuse injuries and burnout among athletes that have been tied to chronic injuries and health-related problems later in life.
The 2024-25 Multi-Sport Participation Survey received responses from 82.7 percent of member high schools and showed 45.4 percent of athletes at those MHSAA member high schools participating in two or more sports, an increase of six tenths of a percent from 2023-24. Multi-sport participation has shown increases every year of the study – and a combined increase of 2.6 percent since the first study after the 2017-18 school year.
For 2024-25, 47.8 percent of male athletes and 42.3 percent of female athletes played multiple sports. The percentage of multi-sport athletes remains inversely proportional to schools’ enrollments, as Class D schools again enjoyed the highest percentage of multi-sport athletes at 63.1 percent, followed by Class C schools (59.6), Class B (49.3) and Class A (38.5).
All four enrollment classifications also continued to show increasing multi-sport participation. Class A multi-sport participation increased three tenths of a percent from 2023-24 and is now up 2.6 percent from 2017-18 survey results. Class B increased 1.3 percent from the previous year and is also up 2.6 percent since 2017-18. Class C multi-sport participation grew two tenths of a percent over the previous year and sits 4.4 percent higher than the first study, and Class D multi-sport participation in 2024-25 remained the same as in 2023-24 and has grown five percent over the last seven years.
The MHSAA Task Force also recommended measuring multi-sport participation in MHSAA member schools to recognize “achievers” – that is, schools that surpass the norm.
Battle Creek Harper Creek, Detroit Cody and Grand Rapids Northview have appeared among the top 10 percent of their respective Classes six of the seven years the survey has been conducted. Four more schools have appeared among the top 10 percent of their Classes five of the seven years: Decatur, East Grand Rapids, Manton and Warren Michigan Collegiate. Detroit Douglass, Parma Western and Lake Leelanau St. Mary have appeared among the top 10 percent of their Classes four times apiece.
In Class A, Grand Rapids Northview (79.4 percent) posted the highest percentage of multi-sport athletes for 2024-25, followed by Macomb L’Anse Creuse North (70 percent), Detroit Cass Tech (61.4) and Sterling Heights Stevenson (60.7) also reporting at least 60 percent.
Warren Michigan Collegiate paced Class B schools with 91.3 percent of athletes playing multiple sports, followed by Tecumseh (77.7), Yale (76.6), Detroit Cody (71.4), Battle Creek Harper Creek (71.3) and Manistee (70.1). Class C saw six schools reach 80 percent for the second-straight school year, led by Jackson Lumen Christi (97.6 percent), Martin (89.7), Bad Axe (89.3), Cass City (88.6), Center Line Prep Academy (83.6) and Decatur (82.3).
Watervliet Grace Christian topped the Class D list at 93.8 percent of athletes participating in multiple sports. Next were Watersmeet (89.7), Lake Leelanau St. Mary (88.2), Detroit Douglass (87.8), Vestaburg (87.7) and Portland St. Patrick (87.3).
The full summary report on the Multi-Sport Participation Survey is available on the “Multi-Sports Benefits” page.
24th WISL Conference Set for Feb 2-3
By
Geoff Kimmerly
MHSAA.com senior editor
January 6, 2020
The first, largest and longest-running program of its type in the country, the Michigan High School Athletic Association’s Women In Sports Leadership Conference will take place Feb. 2-3 at the Crowne Plaza Lansing West.
The 24th edition of the conference again will feature three keynote speakers and a variety of workshops. The program annually attracts upwards of 500 participants, most of them high school female student-athletes. High school students, coaches and administrators are invited to find registration information on the MHSAA Website.
Cost is $50 for students and $60 for adults, not including lodging for those intending to stay overnight in Lansing. A registration form for lodging also is available on the MHSAA Website.
The theme for this WISL Conference is “The Courage to Lead” – and the opening address will be delivered by two-time Olympic women’s soccer gold medalist Lindsay Tarpley. She led Portage Central to the MHSAA Division 2 championship as a sophomore in 2000, was named college soccer’s National Player of the Year in 2003 after leading University of North Carolina to the NCAA Division I title, and played for the U.S. national team until retiring in 2011. She will speak on setting high standards and challenging one’s self to be a leader throughout life.
Michigan State University women’s volleyball coach Cathy George will challenge participants to embrace a growth mindset and believe in themselves and their potential while speaking at the WISL Banquet during the evening of Feb. 2. George recently completed her 15th season at MSU and 33rd overall as a college head coach. Her 288 wins at MSU are the most in program history, and she has a career record of 653-429 – counting also 11 seasons leading Western Michigan University, five at University of Texas-Arlington and two at North Dakota State. She has taken 15 teams to the NCAA Tournament, including MSU to the Elite Eight in 2017 and Texas-Arlington to the Final Four in 1989. As an athlete, George was a team captain and three-time all-league selection at Illinois State, helping the Redbirds to three NCAA Tournament appearances.
Michigan’s 43rd Secretary of State Jocelyn Benson will speak during the opening session Feb. 3 on expanding opportunities for girls and women as athletes, coaches, sport executives and leaders. She chairs Michigan’s Task Force on Women in Sports, which brings together local and national leaders to develop strategies that support and promote opportunities for girls and women in athletics, and is a founding board member and former CEO of the Ross Initiative in Sports for Equality. Benson is a graduate of Harvard University Law School and expert on civil rights law, education law and election law. As dean of Wayne State University Law School, she was the youngest woman in U.S. history to lead a top-100 accredited law school, and she became in 2015 one of the youngest inductees into the Michigan Women’s Hall of Fame.
Workshops offered during the WISL conference include topics on coaching, teaching and learning leadership; sports nutrition and performance, and injury prevention; empowerment and goal-setting, and building team chemistry and program culture. A complete itinerary is available on the MHSAA Website.
The WISL Banquet will include the presentation of this year’s Women In Sports Leadership Award. The winner will be announced later this month.
Follow the #WISL hashtag on Twitter to learn more about the conference’s activities.