A meeting Friday of Northwest Suburban Conference activities directors will help determine whether the conference will appeal the placement of three additional schools starting in 2014-15.
Irondale, Spring Lake Park and Totino-Grace were informed of their NWSC placement earlier this week. Those schools and the conference have 10 days to appeal. None of the three schools will appeal, their activities directors said.
Of chief concern, NWSC executive secretary Dan Dehnicke said, are the added logistical challenges brought on by a 14-team conference.
"I don't know right now if it's going to be appealed or not," Dehnicke said Wednesday. "There are a lot of things to look at when you add three schools."
Activities directors will not vote Friday on whether to appeal, Dehnicke said. But their feedback will help determine whether or not a vote will be heard next week. Nine of the 11 schools must vote to appeal and inform the Minnesota State High School League by 4 p.m. Aug. 29.
The high school league's placement committee used four criteria for its decision: geography, enrollment, programs offered and conference structure.
Irondale, Spring Lake Park and Totino-Grace are members of the North Suburban Conference, which is dissolving after the 2013-14 school year.
The current full-fledged NWSC member schools are Andover, Anoka, Blaine, Centennial, Champlin Park, Coon Rapids, Elk River, Maple Grove, Osseo, Park Center and Robbinsdale Armstrong. Totino-Grace is in its second season as a football-only member of the NWSC.
