Advice: Homeless runner

[qcyrunner]

I feel for you having to face this challenge. My heart says to go with your wife's advice. The dilemma is the possibility of others misconstruing your intentions. You are debating the Christian thing to do which is showing compassion for a person in need. I would confer with your administration if you feel doing the right thing could in any way jeopardize your position either with the school or your coaching. We are coaches and this does put us in a very close contact with a segment of the student body. When all is said and done a lot of our athletes are as close to our families as our own children. Seek advice before proceeding. Best of luck.

[ROCK]

As a teacher in the Chicago Public School System, I am aware that our board policy on homeless students is to allow the student to attend the school, without any removal from any extra-curricular activities.
I have looked on the IHSA website about this. I was dumbfounded to see that there is no policy on this. The closest thing I could relate it to was their policy on transfer students. Was this student a transfer? If he has attended your district previously, then he should be recognized as eligible, as he would not have to submit any proof of residency.
In terms of you giving him a guest room, in my opinion that might be two steps backwards in terms of his eligibilty. First off, you would have to obtain custody to do that (there is a legal term called educational custody-very complex). Getting custody might not happen. The parent would lose aid, and it could get tied up in courts for a while. You would have a rough time convincing the parent(s) to sign off on custody.
If you were to just give the kid a room, it might be regarded as an advantage that is not given to every student.
If push were to come to shove, I really don't think that the IHSA would declare the student ineligible. It is an unfortunate situation for the student. I would also find that to deem him inelligible would be a discriminatory policy. There might already be a legal precidance here.
Jon Gordan is the Coach at Northside Prep, and is also a lawyer. Jon comes on these message boards from time to time- Jon- SOME LEGAL ADVISE PLEASE???
If I were you I'd contact Ron McGraw at the IHSA (309-663-6377; his direct line; please don't abuse it) and explain the situation. Ron is a very understanding person. I could see him saying to let the kid run, that because there is no IHSA policy on this, it would be unreasonable to have an eligibility hearing about this.