Terrace cries "we won't play against big boys anymore"

[RugbyReg]

I'm an ex-Terrace boy. Wouldn't want to see them stop playing, but agree with the stance.

THE chair of the Queensland GPS School Headmasters is set to ban boys from playing rugby union amid fears they could die in a sporting "arms race".

Peter Chapman, principal of St Joseph's College, Gregory Terrace, said serious injury could result from the excessive size and strength of some schoolboy teams with a win-at-all-costs agenda.

Combined GPS Old Boys vice-chair Arthur Palmer made an even more dire prediction.

"With this process proceeding the way it is now, death is unavoidable," Mr Palmer said.

A Courier-Mail investigation has uncovered the state's top private schools recruiting rugby talent from overseas, interstate and regional Queensland on "sports scholarships" involving millions of dollars in waived or drastically-reduced school fees.

Many targeted players, through earlier talent identification programs, have undergone heavy weights and conditioning regimens since their mid-teens.

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* GPS rugby: Rich coaches stalk young guns
* Mike Colman: Old boys need rugby

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Fast-maturing boys of Polynesian descent are also keenly sought.

The scholarship deals are bankrolled by wealthy old boys, although funds are sometimes also sourced from school revenue.

This means that full fee-paying families are in effect subsidising their free-riding sports stars.

Often these imported boys do not enter their adopted school until Year 11, with some still arriving as late as Year 12 – in flagrant breach of GPS sporting rules.

"The process at the moment is unchecked," Mr Chapman said.

"There's no clear regulations or guidelines around what constitutes a fair and safe competition."

Mr Chapman said he had warned his eight fellow Great Public School Association heads that he would no longer tolerate his school's rugby teams – including the First XV – contesting "grossly unmatched" fixtures.

He said he would consider withdrawing "Terrace" sides from games on a case-by-case basis.

"If we were going to come up against a team that is far superior in size and where I think kids might be injured, I'd have to step in and say, 'Look, I just don't think it's appropriate that we play on (this) particular occasion'," he said.

Mr Chapman said Terrace, which finished fifth in last year's First XV premiership, refused to offer sports scholarships or bursaries – which are outlawed among Sydney's leading private schools.

He said long-term students who had attended his school in "good faith" did not deserve to be displaced from sporting teams in the chase for trophies and marketing kudos.

"If you're selective, maybe you'll get bigger kids," he said. "But I work with the cohort I've got. I'm not selecting kids in the senior school to come in and enhance the result in a sporting competition."

Mr Chapman's position raises the prospect of a showdown at the next GPS headmasters' meeting, due before the May 8 launch of the rugby season.

Nudgee College, Anglican Church Grammar School (Churchie), The Southport School, Brisbane Grammar School, Ipswich Grammar School, Toowoomba Grammar School and Brisbane Boys' College each admit to offering forms of sports scholarships.

Brisbane State High School, the association's only government-run, non-fee paying school, provides limited places outside its catchment area to "sporting merit" students. Last year, eight of its all-conquering First XV won places in the Australian Schoolboys side which toured the UK.

The State High team had earlier handed Brisbane Grammar a 103-nil drubbing, underpinning the emergence of a two-tier competition that has left parent and supporter groups fuming.

 

[RugbyReg]

RICH coaches are stalking families at rugby carnivals with lucrative on-the-spot offers of sports scholarships to prestigious schools.

One Gold Coast mother revealed a Brisbane GPS school First XV coach had driven to Southport to watch her 15-year-old son in a 2007 tournament.

She said: "My son hadn't been playing for five minutes and the coach said, 'Can I speak to you and your husband?'

"Then he said, 'We'll take him'."

Geographic, educational and even religious barriers dissolve in the face of poaching raids from normally exclusive GPS member schools.

From Cairns to NSW, the cream of public and independent school rugby union (and sometimes rugby league) talent is picked off and ushered into the unfamiliar environs of stately student boarding houses.

Anglican Church Grammar School, known as Churchie, last year gave scholarships to two Year 11 state-level rugby schoolboys from Siena, a Catholic college on the Sunshine Coast.

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This year, another Siena student – a Queensland under-15 rugby representative – has joined the school in Year 11.

The boy's father said his son's two-year Churchie tuition was free, a saving of more than $30,000.

"We have to pay half the boarding fee – about $8000 a year," he said.

"Some of the initial application fees, that was like $1200 or $1500 . . . they waived that too."

Nudgee College's pilfering of gifted young sports people from non-GPS schools in its own Catholic nest has raised ire.

A headmaster of a well-known Brisbane Catholic high school recently sought an interview with Nudgee principal Daryl Hanly to request a stop to poaching as it ran counter to the "Christian Brothers' ethos".

Meanwhile, sports master Scott Maguire from Kedron's Padua College – a Catholic boys' school in the Associated Independent Colleges (AIC) competition – decries the subterfuge involved.

Mr Maguire said his school last year lost a Year 7 rugby player to a Nudgee College scholarship.

"He was at a state carnival at Townsville and his mother walked out of the tournament and there was this guy with a prospectus asking the boy to come to Nudgee next year," Mr Maguire said.

"She's taken the offer and I don't begrudge her.

"But I also knew the actual sports coach from Nudgee who went up there and when I rang him, he denied blankly having been in Townsville.

"Then he came around and (admitted) it."

While most GPS schools declare academic scholarships, only The Southport School advertises "sport scholarships".

Others offer part or full fee remittance for rugby or alternative sporting prowess under jargon such as "needs-based" or "special ability" bursaries.

Most schools say the offers are disseminated only to financially struggling families, but The Courier-Mail has spoken to sports scholar parents who are engineers and major company managers.

Students on these scholarships are not required to sit prerequisite academic tests.

Parents of sports scholarship-holders who have attended Nudgee College, Churchie and The Southport School over the past two years say they were not interviewed by school principals.

Applicant interviews were conducted by either the directors of rugby, sport or activities.

Three families said Nudgee College's then First XV coach Todd Dammers also attended their interview.

Parents say bidding wars for their sons' services may quickly ignite between two or more schools, enabling better outcomes to be leveraged.

One mother described how a GPS school was so desperate to beat off a rival offer for her star footballer that she was able to broker a second sports scholarship for the boy's brother – despite his relatively modest ability.

The school community came to know the deal as the "two for one".

Most schools deny directly head-hunting sports stars, claiming instead it is the scholarship applicants who make the initial approach.

Yet Queensland Rugby Junior Reds coach Jason Gilmore – responsible for identifying and developing a 300-strong pool of the state's best 14 to 16-year-old players – said he fielded inquiries from GPS schools.

"Some of the schools might give me a call and say, 'Hey Gilly, have you heard about this player, can you give me some background on him?' or 'can you pass on his contact details?"' Gilmore said.

"I'll contact the families and say, 'Look, we've had an approach from this school. If you're interested, do you mind if I pass your details on?"'

Gilmore said he also attended major underage rugby league matches and carnivals seeking talent to potentially switch codes and join the Junior Reds.

"So after the under-15 rugby league state champs, for example, (GPS) schools will ring up and say, 'Did you get any good players? Can you send on any details of performance of the boys at the carnival? Is there anyone of note?"' he said.

Gilmore said he sometimes made the first move, sounding out schools about placing players.

But only at the behest of families.

He said: "If a family goes, 'Look, we're thinking rugby might be a go, are there any schools that might be interested?' then I'll go and have a chat to a couple of schools within the GPS set-up."

 

[RugbyReg]

IT WAS soon after I had moved to Brisbane from Sydney that I found myself at an inner-city hotel with a group of solicitors aged in their 30s.

They were arguing about the bona fides of a colleague. Apparently he had claimed to have played first-grade rugby. One of the lawyers said he hadn't; another said he had, but only a few games.

A third reckoned the bloke was fair dinkum. Not only had this fellow played first grade, he said, but he had actually played against him.

"You played first-grade rugby?" I asked, looking at his meagre frame. "Who for?"

I expected to hear Brothers, or Souths or Jeeps.

What I got was, "Grammar".

Silly me. Where I came from first grade meant . . . well, you know, grown ups.

In Brisbane in 1983 it meant school rugby. More specifically GPS school rugby.

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It was my introduction to a phenomenon that I still experience today. In Sydney, when you sit down with a group of strangers they want to know where you live, how much you paid for it and how far it is from the water.

In Brisbane they want to know where you went to school.

Not that there's anything wrong with that.

From my experience, the Brisbane Old Boys' network is a very positive force. Who could not be impressed by the school ties that saw a group of Terrace old boys start the Youngcare organisation when the wife of one was struck down with a debilitating illness?

And where would the private school system be if not for the fundraising activities of old boys' foundations providing world-class facilities and bursaries?

To be an outsider at an old boys' function and to witness the affiliation and affection ex-students retain for each other and their school is to be amazed and even a little jealous.

In many cases there is nothing a committed GPS old boy wouldn't do for his school. And all he asks is one little thing in return.

A winning footy team.

A psychologist would probably tell you it's a transference thing. Old boys look at the current First XV and see themselves 10, 20, 30 years earlier. The better the current team is, the better they were.

Or maybe it's just that they like winning.

Either way, a major reason why GPS schools place such importance on the performance of their First XV is the old boys.

A winning team means a happy old boy, and a happy old boy is a generous old boy.

Incredible as it might seem to some, the standard of the First XV can even be a major factor in enrolments.

I have a friend who was a sports star at Sydney Grammar in the 1970s, as was his father and grandfather before him. In the 1980s the headmaster of Sydney Grammar announced his school would not be a party to the "arms race" GPS sport had become. It would lose with honour and, if necessary, forfeit First XV matches against opposition considered too strong.

My friend, announcing: "I'm not going to spend the next 12 years of my life watching my team get thrashed", sent his three sons to The King's School.

So when a GPS headmaster receives irate calls from old boys demanding a better First XV, he listens.

Especially when they say they'll pay for it.

And if that means some hardworking but less talented players stepping aside for the greater good of the school, so be it.

I have another friend who played in the First XV at a Brisbane GPS school. So did his father-in-law. He had two sons at the school who played in A teams right through to their final year, when they were relegated to the seconds to make way for "scholarship winners" from the Pacific Islands.

"They could have been in the Firsts like their father and grandfather," he said. "I asked them if they were disappointed and they said it didn't matter, but I think it did. If not now, then later on when they can't say they were in the Firsts."

And his feelings?

"Well, I guess it just teaches them that life isn't fair. There will be times when someone gets the job they should have because they're related to the boss or someone will get a promotion they don't deserve because they suck up. It's a tough world out there."

 

[TOCC]

whats with the sudden focus on GPS schools?

 

[Geronimo]

It's interesting TOCC that so many people have a crack at TSS in regard to the import policy at the school. Mostly from parents and old boys from schools that do not have "sporting scholarships". Some say it is jealousy, but I do recall parents of boys that were displaced in the 1st XV here in the early 2000's were none too happy. This has been simmering for some time and it is a surprise that all of a sudden this has appeared in the CM

 

[chief]

This week the Courier Mail will do a series of articles about these things. Tomorrow they are focusing on Samoan imports.

A few trends, and things which need to go.

• 
  The apparent repeating culture that these schools have, BSHS being the main offender. I feel school is about education, and you don't repeat so you can make the Australian Schoolboys Rugby team. It becomes a bit of a farce, and certainly is not in the spirit of rugby. I hope these articles have forced a large contingent of these school principals to address the problem.
• 
  Limiting the Rugby scholarships and sporting ones. If they do have talent, let the QRU see it, while they are playing Rugby League, or Club Rugby. I think it is unfair for the schools
  
• If they are going to end up playing Rugby League, leave them alone, and once again let the QRU see it.
• Limit the scholarships, it is amateur rugby.

 

[rugbywhisperer]

TSS this year have 2 players in the 1st XV that came to the school last year and another 2 that came at the end of 2008. From my discussions with the parents whom we all know well, they were coming to the school anyway, none are what you would call world beaters yet they fit in very well and compliment the side.
Whereas in 2001 the 1stXV had to be introduced to each other at the start of the year – but that was an exception – 100 year anniversary of the school.
Nowadays, due to a great early years development program, they do not have the number of newly sponsored players that many people purport them to have. Many players get branded as scholarship when in fact they aren’t. They have many who have been at the school for many years; Lindsay Crook started at TSS in year 2, Fairnington in grade 4, Petoa in grade 5, Slipper and Kleimeyer in grade 9, O’Connor grade 10, and the rest have been there for many years - are these classified as imports. No - it is reward for effort and service. TSS also do not allow repeats if the student does not perform well academically. Some try and are usually rejected.
Whereas Nudgee have a whole truckload of new players just arrived from overseas by the look of them but not many of them will be in the 1st's this year.
BSHS is a tried and true one for repeating. It does bring them undone though in that they can have too many eventual school leavers in the team but I hear they are addressing it and have actually refused a couple of repeats for this year. Good on them.
As for big overstrength players – gees – they are schoolboy players who are all too aware of their pathway and many take it very seriously. Some have actually been working toward this for many years. Lindsay Crook has been a state and nationally ranked sprinter for many years, he trains the house down without prompting and he is big fit and fast. Do we now penalise him and players like him by saying you are too good, let’s not play – bunkum.
So because a kid does the work does that make him dangerous. I might suggest these schools that are complaining actually implement some better fitness regimes rather than bring the pack back to their standard.
I do agree however that the concentration of talent at Qld GPS schools is not healthy for the broad base – however every argument has two sides and the quality of Qld QPS rugby is now such that if I had a talented kid that’s where I would want him to go. Firstly because the quality of playing and training is so damned good and secondly he will probably get noticed ahead of club players.

 

[Pfitzy]

I understand completely the issues Terrace is facing. Having my smaller than average son go up against some of the PacIslands monsters is something Mrs the Aussie will not contemplate.

 

[Reddy!]

I never went to a GPS school, but I respect what Terrace is doing and have always had a good experience whenever I have encountered Terrace boys or old boys compared to other schools around the place. I don't think winning rugby in high school should be no.1 on the agenda of schools. And it doesn't stop at rugby, what about swimming, athletics, etc etc.

I think scholarships should offer kids with a talent the opportunity to a good education at a supposed good school, and not be seen as a weapon to beat other schools.

There is alot of politics in GPS, AIC and any school that takes it's sport seriously. Having the right last name (son of a certain old boy) will get you far in sport, and sometimes the better athletes find themselves sitting on the sideline.

For the record I went to Marist Ashgrove, and it would be great if one day they were included in the GPS competition, but it'll never happen, too much politics involved, which I could go into, but it's not necessary for this thread.

 

[BRIX]

GPS Rugby 2011

I don't know what the hell is going on back home.

10 years ago, when I was still in school, poaching of young New Zealanders and Papua New Guinean talent was a common practice. Not only to offer them the oppertunity to make a career out of rugby, but also to afford the child an education.

I'm all about fair play and kids being able to play rugby in high school, but thats what the 2nd's, 3rd's and 4th's teams are for. Depriving talent a right to play rugby, get educated and maybe one day represent their adopted country in the name of fair play is hypcritical.

Sensationalistic, self righteouss quotes such as the one about the potential of children dying on the pitch is not only unprofessional but sick. This shit has been going on for years, keep your politics and scare tactics out of our schools.

http://www.news.com.au/national/dea...warns-headmaster/story-e6frfkvr-1225852508437

The headmaster of a top private school is set to ban boys from playing rugby union amid fears they could die in a sporting arms race.

Peter Chapman, the principal of St Joseph's College, Gregory Terrace, in Brisbane, said serious injury could result from the excessive size and strength of some schoolboy teams with a win-at-all-costs agenda.

One of his colleagues made an even more dire prediction.

"With this process proceeding the way it is now, death is unavoidable. You will have a death on the paddock," said Arthur Palmer, a vice-chairman of Queensland's Great Public Schools association.

His warning came as The Courier-Mail discovered that some of the country's top private schools were recruiting rugby talent from overseas on "sports scholarships" involving millions of dollars in waived or drastically-reduced school fees.

Grossly unmatched

The scholarship deals are bankrolled by wealthy old boys, although funds are sometimes also sourced from school revenue.

"The process at the moment is unchecked," said Mr Chapman, who is chairman of GPS, an association of nine private schools in Queensland.

"There's no clear regulations or guidelines around what constitutes a fair and safe competition."

Mr Chapman said he had warned his fellow GPS heads that he would no longer tolerate his school's rugby teams contesting "grossly unmatched" fixtures.

He said he would consider withdrawing his sides from games on a case-by-case basis.

"If we were going to come up against a team that is far superior in size and where I think kids might be injured, I'd have to step in and say, `Look, I just don't think it's appropriate that we play on (this) particular occasion'," he said.

Mr Chapman said Terrace, which finished fifth in last year's First XV premiership, refused to offer sports scholarships or bursaries - which are outlawed among Sydney's leading private schools.

He said long-term students who had attended his school in "good faith" did not deserve to be displaced from sporting teams in the chase for trophies and marketing kudos.

"If you're selective, maybe you'll get bigger kids," he said.

"But I work with the cohort I've got. I'm not selecting kids in the senior school to come in and enhance the result in a sporting competition."

 

[TOCC]

Brisbane Times, Mark McBain and Phil Lutton are also getting involved now

http://www.brisbanetimes.com.au/rug...s-commodities-to-be-traded-20100412-s3zc.html
http://www.brisbanetimes.com.au/rug...d-with-scholarship-reports-20100412-s3jz.html
http://www.brisbanetimes.com.au/rug...ools-fatally-flawed-mcbain-20100412-s41a.html

 

[TerryTate]

Despite the amateur history which the game has is this not simply a changing of the times and the way things are done.
American Universities have more of an issue with controversies surrounding schools directly paying players. However with Rugby Union being a professional sport now isn't it only natural that the grassroots will develop a more professional/ cut throat approach as well?

Having said that I think it is highly unfair to "import" as they say players in Year 11 and 12 when there have been players who have been striving for the 1st XV from a young age.

"Fair & Safe": We are in a Professional era of sport and in reality Private Schoolboy rugby seems to be the main outlet of our current Super franchise players... I think it's becoming survival of the fittest whcih in turn means that maybe it isn't recruitment that is the problem with this school but rather a decent Strength & Conditioning program which prepares players who want to play Rugby.

 

[TOCC]

im in two minds, you cant blame the parents for agreeing to it, giving there son the best chance for a better education, however if it becomes a case of poaching from schools within the same competition then it will become rediculous.

 

[Geronimo]

I feel I may get shouted down here, but surely school is for education and the rugby clubs are for rugby development. Don't get me wrong, I'm all for having a good rugby program in the school and developing players but leave it within the school. Schools are not rugby franchises. Don't get carried away with the prestige of having to win all the time at school, there's plenty of time for that later on. I'm very proud of my school's rugby titles but I also would be prouder if they were done with no imports. Where will it all end.......the GPS competition is a proud one......but it will end as some schools are refusing to enter the bidding war that is enticing players to the school. It may not be this year but it will reshape the comp!

 

[Geronimo]

im in two minds, you cant blame the parents for agreeing to it, giving there son the best chance for a better education, however if it becomes a case of poaching from schools within the same competition then it will become rediculous.

You are absolutely correct here TOCC, who can blame the parents for accepting what could be a life changing opportunity for the child (children). On the other hand you can't blame full fee paying parents for getting upset when the fees they are paying are subsidising a boy who has taken their boy's spot in the prestigious 1st XV

 

[Reddy!]

I feel I may get shouted down here, but surely school is for education and the rugby clubs are for rugby development. Don't get me wrong, I'm all for having a good rugby program in the school and developing players but leave it within the school. Schools are not rugby franchises. Don't get carried away with the prestige of having to win all the time at school, there's plenty of time for that later on. I'm very proud of my school's rugby titles but I also would be prouder if they were done with no imports. Where will it all end.......the GPS competition is a proud one......but it will end as some schools are refusing to enter the bidding war that is enticing players to the school. It may not be this year but it will reshape the comp!

nah, I agree with you. Seems like it is becoming similar to what happens in America with College football. I'm surprised nobody has posted this video up yet, I think it illustrates the Terrace situation quite accurately, except imagine the teachers as muscle bound islander boys.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dzeeaEsIFLs

 

[Lion]

Gents,

I havent follwed the GPS competition closely. Were Terrace thrashed by a school with imports?
I thought Terrace were competitive.


What kind of message does this send the young men of Terrace. Son you cant win or it might be a bit tuff so we quit.
Come the HSC or the QLD equivilent will Terrace ask that children from Asian countries, who have greater propensity (sp?) to studying not be allowed to take the same exam.

If the schools are creating opportunities for those less fortunate and create a win win for both parties then good on them.
Having met Zac Shuster recently, what a fantastic, polite and articulate young man. Churchie should be proud.


Cheers

 

[leftside]

Gents,

I havent follwed the GPS competition closely. Were Terrace thrashed by a school with imports?
I thought Terrace were competitive.


What kind of message does this send the young men of Terrace. Son you cant win or it might be a bit tuff so we quit.
Come the HSC or the QLD equivilent will Terrace ask that children from Asian countries, who have greater propensity (sp?) to studying not be allowed to take the same exam.

If the schools are creating opportunities for those less fortunate and create a win win for both parties then good on them.
Having met Zac Shuster recently, what a fantastic, polite and articulate young man. Churchie should be proud.


Cheers

Just my two cents:

No, Terrace have not been thrashed by any schools with imports in the last couple of years, they have actually been quite competitive.

As another Terrace old boy who finished in the last couple of years, I believe that Chappo's (GT principal) gotten it wrong. When I was at Terrace, there was a great deal of pride amongst every single rugby team, and within the school, because we were able to compete with these other schools.

I think that if you were to ask every Terrace boy if they wanted to boycott games, the answer would be a unanimous and resounding 'no'. I don't think that it's fair for Chapman to delve into other schools' stances on importing or not importing players. Terrace's fabric and spirit is made up of this pride, a sense of community with being competitive and in some cases 'punching above our weight' when it comes to the sporting arena.

Other schools may not choose to take this approach, and fair enough; this is how they choose to build the culture of their school. So, in fact as a Terrace old boy, I do not have any issues with other schools importing, as it increases the standard of the GPS and gives some of these kids opportunities that they might not have been given otherwise.

It also helps to create the passion and spirit of Terrace, and for this I am proud to be a GT old boy.

 

[rugbywhisperer]

In trying to be a bit objective here, most of the top schools have scholarship players. TSS do it for rugby, swimming, tennis and soccer. One criteria is they must also be of above average academically and the studies must improve.
I cannot speak for other schools on this other that it is obvious that Nudgee do have an inordinate number of Islander lads suddenly appear on their hallowed turf - Kimani Sitauta is one example from last year. This year I understand there are more. They also do appear to get it wrong more often than not.
BSHS being what they are also recruit very strongly however it's a game.
GPS Sydney used to do it extensively in the past.
The thing is - in any GPS 1st XV team - there are NO weaklings about to get killed by bigger lads. If you are in a GPS 1stXV team you are by any standard - good, so please, let’s look at this in the right perspective. Any kid in a 1stXV team would not be afraid of tackling anyone in an opposition team.There would not be a situation where a big Islander lad is about to trample a weakling – if there is it is a selection aberration.
I cannot fathom what is going on in Chappo’s mind. Terrace have a great history. They are not top 3 lately but have won premierships recently, 2005 I think.
For those not prepared to play, there is always Netball , Chess or Soccer.
Yeah, Soccer and AFL offer great opportunities for short rotund athletes that were it not for rugby would be without a sport.

 

[Reddy!]

good post leftside. I don't think teaching young men to give up when it gets too hard is the right message to be sending out.

What I think the Headmaster of Terrace wants is a level playing field. As much as I don't like the nature and reasons behind imported players and scholarships, or players staying back a year, it's been happening for longer than 50 years, and will continue. Just gotta deal with it and see it as a challenge to overcome like you say.