Athletics

Athletics Participation Requirements

• Athletes must have a physical on file in DHS athletic office.  All participants must also complete the MHSAA Health Questionnaire. You only need to do this once each school year. If a student has already turned in their physical for the 23-24 school year, it is on file with the athletic office; it does not need to be submitted again via BigTeams. All physicals will be collected via BigTeams for 24-25. Please do not turn in a paper copy to any office or coach.
• Parents/Guardians must complete the DHS Athletic Registration via BigTeams. Here are step-by-step instructions to use BigTeams. 
• After tryouts are held, scholarships are applied, and rosters are turned in by coaches, athlete families will receive an invoice on Eleyo for the participation fee (if applicable). Payment will be due April 15 for the spring season.

If you need additional information, please contact Dexter Athletics 734-424-4170

• Big Teams Login
• Big Teams Step-by-Step Registration Instructions

• High School: $250 per sport, flat fee
• Middle School: $150 per sport, flat fee.
• There is a family cap of $1,000 per year. ( Athletic Family Max Reimbursement Request Form )

Parents and Guardians of athletes must acknowledge receipt of the athletics handbook, policies, and concussion protocol. The text below is the section of annual acknowledgements that parents of athletes must sign off on each year.  Families only need to review registration (including the athletics information) one time each school year. 

ACCEPTANCE OF DHS ATHLETICS POLICIES
Parents and Students: by including your digital signature on the DCS Acknowledgements Form, you certify that you have read and understood the Dexter Community Schools Athletic Handbook and agree to accept the responsibilities and obligations required to participate in athletics.

CONSENT FOR TREATMENT
Parents and guardians: by signing the Athletics Acknowledgment in the annual DCS Acknowledgements for your student athlete, you:

• Recognize that as a result of athletic participation, medical treatment on an emergency basis may be necessary for your student;
• Recognize that school personnel may be unable to contact you for your consent for emergency medical care; and
• Consent in advance to such emergency care, as may be deemed necessary under the then-existing circumstances. 

CONCUSSION PROTOCOL

• Concussion Protocol for Athletes

1. An athlete must be present at all games and practices as designated by the coach unless absent from school due to personal illness or excused by the coach prior to the absence.
2. An athlete must be in classroom attendance all day in order to dress and participate in an athletic contest and/or practice that day, unless excused by a prearranged special excuse. A special excuse is defined as a doctor, dentist appointment, or a funeral. The student must demonstrate proof upon request from the Coach and Athletic Director. Staying home to rest or calling in sick for half the day is not considered excused absences. This will not meet the all day requirement and the athlete will not be allowed to participate.
3. Under emergency circumstances exceptions to the rule MAY BE GRANTED by the Director of Athletics, Principal or Assistant principal. The coach is to be notified of the granting of the waiver.

Athletic training encompasses the prevention, examination, diagnosis, treatment and rehabilitation of emergent, acute or chronic injuries and medical conditions. Athletic training is recognized by the American Medical Association (AMA), Health Resources Services Administration (HRSA) and the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) as an allied health care profession. (source: http://www.nata.org/about/athletic-training)

MedSport is the sports medicine branch of the Division of Orthopaedics at Michigan Medicine. MedSport provides after school athletic training services including practice and game coverage to care for emergent, acute, and chronic type injuries for Dexter student athletes.  Your Dexter athletic trainers are: 

• Concussion information from the Centers for Disease Control for coaches, parents, and young athletes.
• Concussion Protocol

WINTER SPORTS 

If you are interested in playing a winter sport, please contact the coaches as soon as possible to get on their email list and get important information about the start of the season. In order to participate in athletics (first practice or try-outs) you must have a current physical on file in the athletic office dated after April 15th, 2023. If you have further questions, please contact the Dexter Athletic Department.

To be eligible, a middle school and high school student must comply with the following rules:

1. Enrollment — He/she must be enrolled full time in a high/middle school no later than the fourth Friday after Labor Day or the fourth Friday of February. A student must be enrolled in the school for which he or she competes. Full time enrollment is considered taking four core courses through the school for which the athlete competes.
2. Age — He/she must be under 19 years of age, except that a student whose 19th birthday occurs on or after September 1 of a current school year is eligible for the balance of that school year.
3. Physical Examination — He/she must have passed a current year physical examination. A record must be on file in the Athletic Office. The current year commences the first day after the school year closes in the spring for summer vacation. A physician’s statement for the current school year is interpreted as any physical examination given on or after April 15th of the previous school year.
4. Seasons of Competition — He/she must not have more than four first-semester and four second-semester seasons of competition in a sport in a four-year high school, or three first-semester and three second-semester seasons in a three-year high school, including present seasons. When two seasons leading to a State championship of the same sport are offered, an athlete may participate in only one.
5. Semester of Enrollment — He/she must not have been enrolled for more than eight semesters in grades nine to twelve, inclusive. Seventh and eighth semesters must be consecutive. Three-week enrollment or participation in one or more athletic contests constitutes a semester of enrollment.
6. Undergraduate Standing — He/she must not be a high school graduate.
7. Previous Semester Record — He/she must have received at least two credit hours for work taken during the previous semester of enrollment. (four classes passed)
8. Current Semester Record — Students must maintain academic eligibility in order to be eligible to participate in athletics. High school students must be passing four courses (each course passed equals 1/2 credit per semester) to satisfy MHSAA regulations. Students ineligible by MHSAA standards at the semester’s end will be withheld from athletic competition the succeeding semester.
9. Transfers — Student-athletes must have had an accompanying change of residence by the student’s parent, guardian or other person with whom the athlete has been living during the period of his or her last high school enrollment, into the district or service area of the school, to be eligible during the first semester in attendance.
10. Awards — Student-athletes must not have accepted any award or merchandise exceeding $25 in value for athletic performance. Athletes accepting memberships, privileges, services, negotiable certificates, or money are in violation. For amateur practices, students may not have accepted money, merchandise, memberships, privileges, services or other valuable consideration for participating in any form of athletics, sports, games or for officiating inter-scholastic athletic contests, or have signed a professional athletic contract. (Reinstatement will not be considered for one year.)
11. Limited Team Membership — A student who, after practicing with or participating in an athletic contest or scrimmage as a member of a high school athletic team, participates in any athletic competition not sponsored by his or her school in the same sport during the same season, shall become ineligible for a minimum of the next three contests/days of competition and maximum of the remainder of that season in that school year.

• ABCD Website
• Become a member of ABCD

unified Fall Soccer is underway!

This fall, 30 students and their peer partners are hitting the field for some soccer fun!

Dexter Schools is expanding our programming to encourage involvement for all of our athletes with disabilities and foster peer partnerships from PreK up through high school.  In addition to fall soccer, other activities include a spring Fun Run and a bowling event in December. Adaptive/inclusive PE courses called SOMfit are now offered at Wylie, Creekside and Dexter High School.

Dexter High School joined the Special Olympics Michigan Unified Champion Schools program in February 2023.

“Special Olympics Michigan Unified Champion Schools is a strategy for schools to become more inclusive through the power of Sport, inclusive youth leadership and school-wide awareness. Unified Champion Schools bring students with and without intellectual disabilities together to lead the Unified Champion Schools program in their school and community. Unified Champion Schools empowers youth and educators to create a place of acceptance and understanding for all students.” 
(Special Olympics Michigan Unified Champion School welcome packet).

Schools must meet three requirements to become a Unified Champion School: Unified Sports, Inclusive Youth Leadership, and Whole School Engagement. Dexter High School is committed to inclusion activities for all students including the SNAP club (Students Need Accepting Peers), the Peer to Peer course, weekly SNAP activities (homecoming, movies, lunches, dinners, attending school sports and drama events) the Polar Plunge (held in March 2023), weight lifting, PE classes, yoga, and field trips, all of which helped DHS qualify as a Unified Champion District. 

A new addition to the unified sports program is an inclusive soccer team starting this Fall 2023 with 30 students already signed up, both with special needs and their peer partners.

“We are incredibly proud to earn the distinction of a Special Olympics Michigan Unified Champion School,” shares DHS Principal Melanie Nowak. “At DHS, each and every student matters and belongs. We are more than just a building of many different programs. Instead, there is intentional, strategic effort to intertwine programming and allow students to interact. Mrs. Nowitzke and Mr. Kohler have done a fantastic job creating opportunities for partnerships and friendships to blossom. ” 

Membership in the Special Olympics Michigan Unified Champion Schools program includes grant funding for inclusive programming, as well as a banner which hangs in the DHS cafeteria.

For more information, contact:

MHSAA, which governs high school athletics in Michigan, has very specific rules about student athlete eligibility to participate in sports following a change of schools. Those are outlined here: 

• MHSAA Transfer Regulations