This past month, Lake Park High School, Wheaton North High School, Wheaton-Warrenville South High School and Glenbard North High School have announced that they are leaving the DuPage Valley Conference in the 2018-2019 school year.

Although distance is an issue for athletic competition, the CT staff believes that the recent departure of four DVC schools is ultimately a bad decision. First, it displays the philosophy that it’s okay to quit when difficulty arises. Additionally, the CT has concluded that the quality of the players (not the quantity) are important in athletics. Finally, the departing schools were competitive in the DVC, which further clouds the reason for schools leaving.

In modern society, “participation medals” have become a trigger word. After “determining” that millennials can’t handle losing, the philosophy that “everyone gets a medal” has developed.

In high school sports, this is not the case. In football, a team must get five regular-season wins in order to make play-offs. In recent years, the four departing schools have had difficulties reaching this five-win threshold.

This reason for leaving, bluntly put, is irresponsible and damaging to the departing schools’ students.

Life is not sunshine and rainbows where you don’t have to work to win. That’s just not reality. Rather, you’re going to have to learn how to work for what you want and you’re going to have to work really hard. By leaving the DVC, the schools are telling their students it is okay to quit if you’re not the best.

This lesson is hurtful and detrimental to high school students.

Another one of the arguments for leaving the DVC, according to the departing schools, is the inherent unfairness in population sizes. The following is a list of school populations:

Wheaton North: 2,131

Wheaton-Warrenville South: 2,071

Glenbard North: 2,276

Lake Park: 2,642

Central: 2,908

The populations are not that incredibly different.

Besides this, however, Hinsdale Central shows that one doesn’t need a large population to be successful.

In the 2014-2015 school year, Hinsdale Central High School broke the IHSA record for state championships. They won state championships in the following eight sports: Boys Golf, Girls Golf, Girls Tennis, Boys Cross Country, Boys Soccer, Boys Swimming & Diving and Boys Tennis.

Hinsdale Central, however, has a population of 2828 students.

While a school of 500 is not comparable to Central’s 3,000, the CT staff thinks that a school of 2,000 and above can be competitive with Central’s 3,000 students.

POINT 3: They don’t suck… West Aurora used the same argument when they left

On the CT staff, we have students who have been involved in boys cross country, girls cross country, badminton, girls basketball, girls soccer and boys football. Of these students, all have attested that in their personal experiences, there is no team that is always blown out.

While the badminton player may have said that one school was bad at badminton, the student with girls’ basketball experience said her team was crushed by that same school.

No team had an absolutely terrible losing record, and so the CT staff remained confused as to the schools’ intentions for leaving.

This all being said, the CT staff did come to a consensus on one issue: distance.

All of CT’s athletes mentioned that when they played Lake Park, they got home around 10 p.m. For Lake Park, this means every away game means being out until 10 p.m. on a school night. Our athletes didn’t enjoy traveling so far to Lake Park and it’s presumably that the feeling was shared. Thus, the CT understands Lake Park’s reasoning for leaving the DVC.

Other than Lake Park, the CT staff feels that Wheaton North High School, Wheaton-Warrenville South High School and Glenbard North High School leaving the DVC is a bad decision. From teaching bad lessons to each schools’ ability to be competitive, no good is brought to anyone out of this decision.