By EMILIA TEASDALE
KINDERHOOK—The Ichabod Crane Central School District and the Chatham Central School District will be combining their football programs into a single, shared program starting in the fall 2025 season, pending Section 2 approval, which according to Chatham Superintendent Andrew Kourt should happen in the next month.
This partnership was approved by both districts’ Boards of Education last week at their regular monthly meetings. According to a joint press release from both districts “We are very excited about the opportunity this will provide our student athletes.”
“We will be called Chatham Ichabod Crane (CIC) Football and our colors will be black and white,” the release says.
The districts have scheduled a CIC Football Information Session for team families to attend on Thursday, January 23 at 6 p.m. in the Chatham Middle School auditorium, 50 Woodbridge Avenue.
At the Chatham Board of Education meeting on January 7, Superintendent Kourt said that he was given the task to contact other districts about combining football programs. He reached out to seven schools and said two were interested. Superintendent Kourt and his team meet with both districts and recommended the collaboration with Ichabod Crane (ICC). There were several months of discussions before agreeing on the final municipal agreement being presented to both boards, he said.
“We put a lot of work into this,” he told the board. They voted unanimously to support the agreement.
At the ICC Board of Education meeting, also on January 7, Superintendent Marie Digirolamo said that the board had discussed combining programs at different meetings throughout the year. She pointed out there could be cost savings with sharing the teams. She also answered a question from the board about the cheer squads for both schools, saying each district will maintain their own squad and there will be opportunities for them to perform at games. The ICC board voted to approve the agreement in the consent agenda, where they vote on several items all together. They voted yes unanimously.
The press release, issued after the board meetings, said that this “program upgrade is expected to be budget neutral given the shared costs and potential savings associated with the districts combining resources.”
The release calls this “a true 50/50 partnership” with the athletic directors and superintendents of both districts collaborating to build schedules and work through the logistics of the new program. The location of games and practices will be scheduled evenly between the two campuses and both high schools will continue to host their traditional homecoming events. Ichabod and Chatham will split all costs and share coaching responsibilities.”
The release points out that both Chatham’s and Ichabod’s football programs do not have the numbers to support junior varsity teams. Both districts currently field modified 9 (grades 7-9) and varsity teams, but “our numbers have continued to decline.”
Chatham Athletic Director John Brantley said, in the press release, “This merger with ICC football was inevitable for Chatham moving forward because we have experienced low numbers the past few years. This merger will allow Chatham to have football as an opportunity for Chatham students as well as allow ICC to continue to improve their program to sustain football for the future.”
Moving forward, CIC will have all three levels, with a modified team (grades 7 and 8), junior varsity team and varsity team. “This will allow more opportunities for athletes in both of our districts to participate and will support age-appropriate play, increased program development, and competitive growth. We will continue to play in Class B,” according to the release.
“We are excited for the partnership with the Chatham Football program to take place in the fall of 2025. This will bring more opportunity to both districts’ student-athletes, as well as provide a safer playing field for all,” said ICC Athletic Director Dave Ames in the press release.