This page is intended to summarize and explain the rules, which were revised by USOF Board of Directors action at their November 1, 2003. A copy of the official USOF rules pertaining to the US Interscholastic Championships is included. There may still be some slight punctuation and numbering differences between this copy and the one held by USOF's rules committee, but all phrasing should now be identical.
Identification
It is strongly recommended that students or coaches bring student ID to the event. If your school does not issue ID cards, bring one of the following: copies of report cards, a letter from the principal stating that all students on the team are enrolled and eligible, or a USOF eligibility ruling. If a student's eligibility is contested, you must have the documentation to prove eligibility.
NEW for 2004:
Foreign Student Eligibility
Students from foreign countries who are attending school full-time in the United States, on a student visa, are eligible to compete as part of an Interscholastic Team and as Individuals, assuming that they meet other eligibility requirements (age, grade level, USOF membership, etc). This is a change to USOF Competition rule A.5.6.
Home Schoolers
It has become tougher for home schoolers to meet eligibility requirements. A home-school student may compete if he/she produces a letter from the school Principal stating that he/she is enrolled in that school. At first, this sounds like a contradiction. However, many states allow (or even require) home schooled students to enroll in certain classes such as Chemistry & Biology Labs, JROTC, etc, where equipment and expertise simply cannot be provided at home. However, other states, such as New York, do not allow home-schoolers to be enrolled in any school. It is a complicated issue which will doubtless lead to further study and debate. If you cannot produce a letter from the principal certifying enrollment, I encourage you to look at "Filing for an Eligibility Ruling" below.
Filing for an Eligibility Ruling
If there is any doubt or question over a student's
eligibility, an eligibility ruling should be obtained. Requests for
an eligibility ruling must be submitted to the USOF office at least 30
days in advance of the event registration deadline (in other words, by
March 1, 2004), and will be voted on by the USOF Executive Committee prior
to the entry deadline. Any request for a ruling must come from a
team coach. To request a ruling, contact (e-mail preferred):
Robin
Shannonhouse, USOF, P O Box 1444, Forest Park, GA 30298
If you would like, you may also contact the Event
Director, Mike Minium, for a recommendation,
prior to contacting the USOF office.
Here are some examples of situations which I feel
are within the spirit of the rules and for which I would give a favorable
recommendation to the Executive Committee. This is not intended to
be an all-inclusive list:
1. A home-schooler who is not enrolled in any school would like to
run on a team with the high school in his or her public school district
of residence.
2. A ninth grader who attends a "Freshman" (single grade) school
would like to run as a member of a team with the Middle School or High
School in the same district which "feeds" students to or from that school.
USOF Rules for Interscholastic Events
The following are the USOF Interscholastic rules, based on Board action on November 1, 2003. Corrections were made to reflect ammendments and administrative errors (primarily paragraph numbering). There may still be some slight punctuation and numbering differences between this copy and the one held by USOF's rules committee, but all phrasing should now be identical.
OCIN does not intend to use rule 8 (qualifier / final) this year, so that section may be ignored.
I. Interscholastic events
1. Application of the rules
1.1 Except where specifically
noted in this section, the rules covered by the United States Orienteering
Federation (USOF) RULES FOR ORIENTEERING shall apply to all interscholastic
orienteering events sanctioned by USOF.
2. Definition
2.1 The Interscholastics
team competition is defined as a modified team competition. Each
member competes as an individual and some or all members contribute
to a team score. Interscholastic team competition is gender neutral.
The Interscholastics individual competition is defined as individual combined
score in each Interscholastic class.
3. Competition
3.1 The Interscholastics
will have four team competitions. Three will be school teams; Varsity,
Junior Varsity and Middle School. One will be a JROTC. Note:
School and JROTC teams are not mutually exclusive. JROTC teams that
meet school team requirements are also eligible for the school team award.
3.2 The Interscholastics will have individual competitions in the following categories: High School Varsity Male (HSV-M), High School Varsity Female (HSV-F), High School Junior Varsity Male (HSJV-M), High School Junior Varsity Female (HSJV-F), Middle School Male (MS-M), Middle School Female (MS-F).
3.3 The winning team is determined by adding the lowest three times from among the eligible team members each day. The team with the lowest total time over the day or days competition is the winning team.
3.3 The winning individuals are determined by lowest combined individual time/s over the day/s of competition.
3.4 The Interscholastics
Team Championships are awarded for interscholastic competition for school
HSV, MS and JROTC teams. Individual interscholastic championships are awarded
for each Interscholastic class .
4. Eligibility
4.1 teams
(a) School team members must attend the same private or public school.
MS teams may be composed of 9th graders with 6-8 graders if they attend
the same school. To prove that the students attend the same school,
they must each be able to show school ID for the same school or, if the
school does not issue ID’s, a letter from the principal stating that the
students are enrolled at the school.
Teams competing only for the JROTC trophy must be made up of students from the same JROTC unit per the unit's most current Unit Enrollment Report.
If home-schooled, a student is eligible for a school team provided he/she produces a letter from the school principal stating that the student is enrolled at the school.
(b) Teams are gender neutral. Each team may consist of any combination of male and/or female from the eligible categories.
(c) Team members in the Interscholastics School and JROTC Team Championships competition, must meet eligibility requirements for U.S. Champion Rule A.5.6 for the team to be awarded a championship title. **note that A.5.6 was changed in 2003 to allow foreign student eligibility - new version at the bottom of this page**
4.1.1 Interscholastic High School Varsity Teams shall consist of 3 to 5 students who meet the following criteria:
a) Are in 9th - 12th grade
b) Are 19 years old or younger as of December 31st of the current year.
c) Have competed in three or fewer previous Interscholastics at the Varsity or Junior Varsity levels.
d) Are competing in the HSV-M and / or HSV-F classes.
4.1.2 Interscholastic Junior Varsity teams shall consist of 3 to 5 students who meet the following criteria:
a) Are in 9th - 12th grade
b) Are 17 years old or younger as of December 31st of the current year.
c) Have competed in three or fewer previous Interscholastics at the Varsity or Junior Varsity levels.
d) Are competing in the HSJV-M and / or HSJV-F classes.
4.1.3 Interscholastic Middle School teams shall consist of 3 to 5 students who meet the following criteria:
a) Are in 6th - 9th grade. Note special 9th grade requirement from 4.1.(a).
b) Are 16 years old or younger as of December 31st of the current year.
c) Have competed in three or fewer previous Interscholastics at the Middle School level.
d) Are competing in the MS-M and / or MS-F classes.
4.1.4 Interscholastic JROTC teams shall consist of 3 to 5 students who meet the following criteria: Note to qualify for the school competition the team must meet the school team requirements too.
a) Are in 9th - 12th grade.
b) Are 14 - 19 years of age as of December 31st of the current year.
c) Are competing in any of the Interscholastic categories. Note: teams that are intending to compete for the JROTC trophy at the championships must consist of HSV-M and / or HSV-F competitors.
4.2. Individuals
4.2.1 To win individual awards competitors must be competing in one of the interscholastic categories. To be eligible for the Individual Championships competition, competitors must be competing in one of the interscholastic categories and meet eligibility for U. S. Champion Rule A.5.6. **note that A.5.6 was changed in 2003 to allow foreign student eligibility - new version at the bottom of this page**
4.3 Eligibility Qualifiers
Requests for eligibility rulings given special circumstances may be submitted
to the USOF Office 30 days in advance of the event registration deadline
and will be ruled on by vote of the USOF Executive Committee prior to the
entry deadline.
5. Courses & Classes
5.1 The following classes will be added for Interscholastics competitions. These classes will be used in individual and team Interscholastic events.
a) High School Varsity (HSV-M) on the Green course.
b) High School Varsity (HSV-F) on the Brown course.
c) High School Junior Varsity (HSJV-M & HSJV-F) on the Orange course.
d) Middle School (MS-M & MS-F) on the Yellow course. Note: for both the JV and MS competitions, the M and F categories may be split between two courses of similar length and difficulty.
5.3 It is recommended that separate courses for the interscholastic classes should be prepared. See START I.7.2.
6. Awards
6.1 Interscholastics awards:
a) Team awards:
1) Top three school teams in High School Varsity, High School Junior Varsity and Middle School shall receive championship awards, totaling nine team awards. For U. S. Interscholastic Championship competition, the traveling HSV & MS Brunton Cups will be awarded to the top HSV, and MS teams.
2) Top three JROTC teams shall receive championship awards, totaling three team awards. For U. S. Interscholastic Championship competition, the traveling JROTC Brunton Cup will be awarded to the top eligible JROTC team. Note: The cup is awarded to the top JROTC team whose members are competing in the HSV-M and/or HSV-F categories.
b) Individual awards:
The top three finishers from the HSV, HSJV, and MS gender classes shall receive awards for a total of 18 individual awards. For U. S. Interscholastic Championship competition, The top three finishers from the HSV, HSJV and MS gender classes shall receive championship awards for a total of 18 awards.
7. Start
7.1 Start intervals shall be 2 minutes. (Rule A.13.6) Special care needs to be taken when assigning start times for interscholastic classes. Students from the same school on the same course shall be started a minimum of 6 minutes apart. All students from the same school should be started as close together as possible to assist their chaperones with logistics. Having large numbers of students waiting throughout the whole start window may cause headaches for the chaperones as well as the organizers.
7.2 In the event an Interscholastic class fills up the maximum start window on a course, (Rule A.3..3.1), it can be moved to a separate course. In the event the class fills up the start window even with a separate course, a one minute start interval or a qualifier/final may be used.
8. Qualifier / Final **section 8 will not be used in 2004.**
8.1 Qualification races for interscholastic events may be used if offering separate courses for each class still fills the start window. First day will be a qualifier and second day a final
8.2 Each interscholastic class that has qualification races requires two courses for that class on each day. Special care needs to be taken when vetting the two qualifier courses for each class to insure that the winning times for each are as equal as possible.
8.3 Start intervals for the qualifier and final will be as explained in I.7.1.
8.4 Team scoring for the qualifier will be based upon the top three finishers from the team. Members of the same team will be evenly distributed between the two courses of the qualifier. In the event one of the qualifier races is thrown out the times from the remaining course will be used. If a team does not have three members on the course, the average of the members on the remaining course will be used to bring the number of finishers up to three as needed.
8.5 For the finals, teams will be divided into A and B finalists. The highest scoring teams from the qualifier will be put on the A final course until the start window fills. All other teams will be put on the B final course. All members from a team will be on the same course with the winning team being determined by adding the lowest three times from among the eligible team members. The winners from the A final will be the winners of the competition.
USOF Rules for Orienteering - Championship title eligibility
5.6 The title of U.S. Champion in any class as determined at an officially designated U.S. Championship Orienteering "A" meet shall be limited to USOF members in good standing who meet one of the following criteria:
a. Are U.S. citizens and citizens of no other country.
b. Are in a permanent residence status commonly referred to as "green card carriers".
c. Hold dual (U.S.) citizenship and reside primarily in the United States.
d. Hold dual (U.S.) citizenship, reside primarily outside the United States, and have not yet and agree not to compete for a championship title in another country during the current calendar year.
e. Are full-time students in the U.S. holding a current student visa.
5.6.1 Requests for clarifications or rulings based on this criteria
may be submitted to the USOF Headquarters in writing 30 days prior to the
registration deadline for the championships.
Flying Pig VIII - U.S. Interscholastic Championship 2004 Page
updated 1000 3/22/2004