A follow-up on the case involving a Lebanon Catholic student-athlete who was denied athletic eligibility after she transferred in from Elco earlier this year:
District 3 and the PIAA both denied Beavers’ junior Hayley Witmer eligibility in basketball this winter and softball in the spring.
The District 3 vote, according to Lebanon Catholic girls’ basketball coach Patti Hower, was 20-0.
Witmer will be eligible to compete for the Beavers during the 2014-15 school year; she also plays volleyball, and will be eligible to play for Lebanon Catholic in the fall.
With Witmer ineligible to play, Hower's team has six players on the roster this season.
District 3 chairman Ron Kennedy, Donegal’s athletic director, said on Tuesday that he couldn’t comment specifically on Witmer’s transfer waiver.
“Her case was a closed hearing,” Kennedy said. “It was a student matter and it must remain private.”
Kennedy said that when anyone transfers from one school to another, principals and athletic directors work in accordance to make sure the intent of the transfer waiver is legitimate.
For example, if students are looking to transfer solely for athletics, or if they’re following another student to another school, red flags go up.
“There is a strict policy,” Kennedy said, “and we have to follow it to the letter of the law.”
Kennedy said Witmer’s case was handled like everyone else’s.
“We’re trying to protect the integrity of the process,” he said. “We look at each transfer case on a case-to-case basis, and that’s exactly what we did here.”