Foot Ball Helmets

High School Rules: New football regulations focus on concussions

As football programs at all levels are coming to understand the long-term effects of concussions and repeated contact to the head, it's no surprise that the newest set of National Federation of State High School Associations football rules gives that issue the highest priority.

Rather than have numerous points of emphasis, as is usually the case with the annual rule books (football and otherwise), there's only one in the 2011 edition: Concussions, contact both to and with the helmet, and helmet technology and proper helmet fitting.

"It's not a rule change," said Bob Colgate, an assistant director at the NFHS who's in charge of the football and wrestling rule books. "We had the concussion rule in place before the NFL and NCAA did."

But the NFHS can't go too far, because now state legislatures are stepping into the arena. There are more than 20 states with laws about concussions, treating concussions and when to allow players to get back on the field, he said, with 20 more working on proposals.

"They're all going to be a little bit different, so we don't get into return-to-play policy."

Still, the NFHS rules emphasize that helmet-to-helmet contact is unacceptable and that coaches should not teach using the head in blocking or tackling. The rulemakers also urge school administrators to do everything possible to ensure that coaches and players are fully aware of the dangers of concussions and that football teams have access to proper equipment. About 60 percent of football concussions are a result of contact by a helmet.

"At the end of the day, it's a physical sport," said Tony Sanchez, the coach at Bishop Gorman (Las Vegas) . He does his best to minimize the risks of the game, but as he points out, "There's no such thing as a concussion-proof helmet."

One actual rule change also addressed player safety, but it probably won't have a great deal of impact.

The definition of a chop block was clarified and expanded to include combination high-low blocks (a block above the waist by one player and below the waist by another) that occur with a time gap between them. The previous rule required the officials to determine if the blocks happened at the same, and only if they happened at the same time would a flag be thrown.

presanporen: Visors For Football Helmets

It is good to see the combined Immigration community efforts are bringing results. However, it appears that no attention is being paid to raise the issue of children ageing out because of visa retrogression and delay in labor clearance. The Child Status Protection Act(CSPA) passed in the year 2002 hardly provides any relief to I-140 based immigration petitions. While for I-130 (for US Citizens) applicants the date of child is frozen on the date of submission of I-130 form it-self, but for employment based immigrant applicants this Act provides a complicated way to calculate the child�s age and it just provides relief for any processing delays in 1-140 clearance only. It just ignores the fact that we have years of retrogression for employment-based category. At the time when this act was passed there was no retrogression in employment-based category and lawmakers perhaps never thought of hardship, which children and families may face because of the retrogression. We need to raise our voice on this issue too. My son is going to miss out the chance of getting his green card just because his age works out as per formula given in CSPA Act to be 21 years and 12 days � because of 12 days my family may be penalized to be separated from our child whereas no one is going to consider 3 years delay in labor case in my case and then another 13 months we have to wait for filing 1485 after approval of I-140. Mine case was the most unfortunate in the sense that I got my I-140 approval in just 29 days whereas in all cases the normal time is 3-6 months. Had it taken 2 months, my son would have got the benefit under CSPA. Sorry to hear your son is going to fall into what I can only describe as a black hole that the system choosed to totally ignore. I faced this situation a year and a half ago and transferred my son to an F1 student visa. As long as he is registered for 12 credit hours in college he gets to stay in the US. This is NOT a long term solution but there are few options available. We have to hope that somebody somewhere who can change things will finally see this as a problem and act on our behalf. I have contacted dozens of senators, congressmen etc etc and in all but two cases did not even get an acknowledgment. my company lawyer responded to my similar question saying they too fear the mid month retrogression, and will try to file ASAP. However, the explanation offered in other posts in this thread (notably, logiclife and shantak) does sound compelling.

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