Quote Originally Posted by Powder View Post
One more thing to add to my previous post. When calculating the enrollment numbers, adjustments are made for the number of kids in the free-and-reduced lunch program. The MSHSL won't come out and say it in so many words but the premise is that kids that come from low income families are less likely to be involved in extra curricular activities so it lowers the number of kids available to go out for a team. If you read between the lines it's a way to try and have the private schools in a higher class than public schools with a similar number of kids.
Boys or girls only schools also have to have their enrollment figure doubled so they are classed properly. You are right about the free lunch adjustments. If a school has more than 50% of its student in the free lunch program, it can petition to be dropped a class on athletics. There haven't been a whole lot of cases where the dropping a class has resulted in an unfair advantage for the larger school, so there is obviously some merit behind the process whether they want to come right and say it or not. There will always be an exception though.