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[quote=Anonymous]Dead periods are rolling and aplicable to certain sports based on calendar season. Each calendar season has its own dead periods.

During dead periods coaches are not permitted to have instructional contact with their players, on campus or off campus. They are allowed to supervise unstructured activities for their players, but not instruct. So, in basketball, a coach may open the gym for his players during dead periods and stay there for safety reasons, but coach may not instruct his athletes. The rules also extend to off campus teams. For example, in basketball, an employee high school coach may not coach more than one player from the school on an off campus team (excluding his own children) during the dead period.

Sophisticated schools get around this. For example, a dominant soccer high school program coach may trust one of the fathers in his program pipeline with multiple sons at the school where the father played high level college soccer and the father is not an employee of the school. The father takes the varsity boys and volunteer coaches them in summer league play during the dead period. Indeed, the HS coach may even show up to their summer games but is under strict instructions not to talk to his players or vice versa because that could be deemed a violation of the dead period (yes, this is an oddly specific example).

Dead periods are meant to target several things:

1.  Most important, give the kids a break from a domineering coach.

2.  Allow kids to sample other sports. A domineering football coach would absolutely run his program 12 months out of the year to the exclusion of other sports.

3.  Allow for rest and recovery.

Some important notes, usually, if your school has an athletics PE period for your child’s sport (your kid goes to a basketball period instead of regular PE during the school day), the dead period will not apply to the PE period.

Dead periods typically apply to all coaches affiliated and paid by the school. If your school hires contract coaches just for the season (e.g., the freshmen team coach) dead period rules still apply to that coach.

Schools/parents will absolutely report dead period violations and most schools take it seriously.

Dead periods have one massive loophole:  if your coach makes instructional time available to the entire student body, then it is typically not a violation of dead period rules. A coach could theoretically host an open gym for the entire school with basketball instruction during the dead period.

Dead periods are near universal. I am unaware of any HS athletic conference that lacks dead periods. Just look at your bylaws. [/quote]

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