WHILE some would run away from controversy or try to brush it under the rug, Inter-Secondary School Sports Association (ISSA) president Dr Walton Small is glad about the furore surrounding the absence of several schools from this year’s Boys’ & Girls’ Athletics Championships because, as he told the Observer, it brought to the fore all the work the association does in the final weeks leading up to the event.

Two-time champions and one of the founding schools of the original championships, St George’s College, along with Morant Bay, St Andrew Technical, Garvey Maceo, Innswood, Norman Manley, Annotto Bay, Tarrant, Frome and Anchovy, were unable to compete at this year’s March 30 to April 2 event after failing to meet the deadline for entries.

Ironically, St George’s head coach Vinton Powell was one of five honourees of the 2011 Championships.

The governing body came under much criticism for its position, but Small told the Observer that the tedious process which follows the deadline for entries has now been brought to public attention.

“People are now aware that after we collect the entries that there is a lot of work that takes place,” he said.

“People think that once the entries come in, that is it. We have over 3,000 athletes and we have to organise these individuals in events and verify birth certificates, attendance, grades, and look at all the development meets that take place. It’s a lot of work and a lot of people now appreciate that.”

Small said that his organisation had received a lot of support for their firm stance about not bending their rules to suit the few schools who missed the deadline.

“Support is there to say that they are supporting the stance taken by ISSA. A lot of individuals who do not want to come out publicly and speak have called to say, hold your ground,” Small stated.

Small was at pains to point out that ISSA had no authority to punish principals as separate entities from the athletes who would ultimately be the ones to miss the championships.

“It is the institution that is an associate of ISSA. ISSA has no authority to penalise principals and coaches… what we can do is say the school itself cannot participate. We cannot say to the coaches and the principals that they can’t.”

The organisation has been criticised for policing itself, but Small said that the system had worked well for more than 100 years.

“Our rules have not been stagnant, they have evolved. When issues come along we look at them and make amendments as is necessary,” he added.

“We as principals are resolute and we understand that if we are taken to court and the law instructs us that we are not doing what is right we have no other option but to look at what the law says, but as it stands right now we police ourselves very well. We have been doing this for over 100 years.

“What we will do is that as we come closer towards deadlines we put in adverts. We empathise with the students. But rules are rules,” Small concluded.