I don't want to get involved in the particulars of this case, but I have
been involved in student ultimate on and off for 8 years (gulp!), and I
don't think that in any of those 8 years there hasn't been some sort
of frantic debate involving student eligibility issues.To make matters
worse this issue always seems to be raised just after a tournament
as a result of some sort of controversial result, and so is never
discussed outside the narrow boundaries of a certain team's
viewpoint. But each year if it's not about part-time students, then
it's post-graduates, or juniors, or students who go to a university
without an ultimate team, or foreigners or whatever.... I could go on.
For some time I have strongly advocated that student ultimate has
grown to such an extent, that it should now become a strictly inter-
university competition run along the lines adopted by BUSA.
Obviously we all know that student ultimate for various reasons is
not a BUSA sport, but it would be very easy for us to adopt their
eligibility criteria, which both for individuals and institutions clear up
very effectively all these difficult issues for us. These are readily
available and would bring ultimate inline with every other university
sport. Admittedly these rules are fairly strict, but I see that as part
of their advantage. Unfortunately it seems eligibility is an issue that
has repeatedly shown itself too difficult to rely on some vague
interpretation of spirit. Luckily there are now enough non-student
tournaments being run that those teams or individuals who might
be made ineligible can still play plenty of great and competitive
ultimate against a wide variety of student and non-student
opposition.
Otherwise I can inevitably see this debate annually re-occuring and
more otherwise great student tournaments also becoming
unfortunately soured in a similar way.....
Andy Tucker (Norm)
