Signatories to the Standard and conformance tracks v0.3 — discussion draft

Status: Proposed normative framework for discussion. No protocol steward, membership body, or external organization has adopted these provisions.

Eligibility for Signatory Status

A school, as defined in the opening provisions, may apply for signatory status. To be eligible, it must have a responsible governing body or accountable officer, a designated contest administrator, a publicly identifiable name, a reliable contact address, a duty to report changes to either, written roster and eligibility procedures, and authority to meet its obligations to opponents, officials, and the Standard’s administrator.

The school’s authority concerns interscholastic representation and compliance. Affiliation with the school does not transfer institutional responsibility for a student’s general elementary or secondary education from the parent or person standing in parental authority. The student must independently satisfy HS-BASE.

A rostered student is a student whom the school has accepted to represent it in specified interscholastic activities for a defined period. Roster status alone does not establish the student’s educational or contest eligibility.

Attainment of Signatory Status

An eligible school attains signatory status only after its authorized representative executes an adoption agreement and the body administering the Standard accepts that agreement under its published procedures. Execution alone does not confer signatory status.

The adoption agreement must identify the school and authorized signer, the version of the Standard accepted, its declared conformance track, the effective period, the school’s duty to certify rosters and respond to eligibility challenges, and its responsibilities for contest administration, officials’ payments, and treatment of officials. It must also identify the applicable rules for reporting, investigation, decisions, remedies, appeals, and withdrawal or termination. These terms require further drafting before any school can obtain signatory status or claim certified conformance.

Signatory Dues

The steward’s governing body may establish signatory dues under a published schedule incorporated into the adoption agreement. A program administrator may collect dues under written delegation. The amount, due dates, permitted adjustments, and consequences of nonpayment remain to be drafted. No dues are imposed by this discussion draft.

Standing

A signatory school remains in good standing only while it meets its continuing obligations under the accepted adoption agreement and applicable provisions of the Standard. The later standing rules must specify renewal, required training, dues, reporting, corrective action, suspension, termination, reinstatement, and notice and review procedures. Good standing is a condition for representing the school as a signatory; it does not alone establish eligibility for any student, team, activity, or contest.

Mandatory Suspension

Reserved. A later provision must identify the specific grounds that require suspension, when suspension takes effect, who makes the determination, what notice and review are available, and how standing may be restored. This heading alone creates no automatic suspension ground.

Conformance tracks

Each signatory school must declare one of the following tracks for the applicable protocol period:

1. UIL conformance track: the school complies with the common Standard and the additional requirements expressly designated for this track, modeled on relevant UIL rules.
2. TAPPS conformance track: the school complies with the common Standard and the additional requirements expressly designated for this track, modeled on relevant TAPPS rules.
3. Core-only track (neither UIL nor TAPPS): the school complies with the common Standard without electing either additional track.

The Standard’s later adoption rules will define the declaration period, effective date, changes of track, and whether different activities may use different tracks. Track requirements should be versioned and documented in separate modules or schedules. Where an external rule changes, the steward must review its effect before changing the Standard’s corresponding track.

Declaring a track is not UIL or TAPPS membership, approval, or a guarantee that a member school may schedule a contest with the adopting school. The external organization controls its own membership and contest rules.

Model for possible external membership categories

This framework is designed so UIL or TAPPS could, if either chooses, adapt it to establish a membership category for schools that roster home-educated students. Such an external category would require that organization’s own rulemaking, admission criteria, and decisions about contest access, representation, enforcement, and classification. The Standard does not create that category within UIL or TAPPS.

Defined terms reserved for later provisions

The Standard will separately define competition season, school year, roster period, good standing, transfer, and activity-specific eligibility. A later season module may offer UIL-aligned or TAPPS-aligned definitions for schools electing those tracks. This section does not adopt either organization’s season definitions yet.