Decades-long tension over whether New York private schools that can recruit student-athletes should be allowed to compete against public school teams has reached a boiling point in Rye.
Section 1 schools in the New York State Public High School Athletic Association, which includes the Rye City and Rye Neck school districts, are currently voting on whether they would support removing the section’s four private schools from postseason play. Ballots are due back June 12, and if the vote passes, Section 1 could become the first in the NYSPHSAA to remove private schools from postseason eligibility, as early as fall 2027.
Rye City School District administrators say this change is needed — and fast. The district argues that the ability of area private schools to recruit student-athletes gives them an unfair advantage over public school teams, which is only exacerbated in the postseason.
“You have the students within your boundaries working within your program, growing, working together to be successful — only to face a Goliath, in a sense, because it feels like you’re competing against an all-star team,” said Susan Reid, the RCSD director of health, physical education, and athletics.
NYSPHSAA sections may change their individual constitutions through a ballot vote. Changes begin at the committee level and then pass through athletic directors before ending up with the section’s Athletic Council — the governing body — for approval.
The four Section 1 schools on the chopping block from postseason play are: Albertus Magnus, a Catholic high school in Rockland County; The Leffell School, a K-12 Jewish school in Hartsdale; the Harrison-based Japanese private school Keio Academy; and the Ursuline School, an all-girls Catholic school in New Rochelle. The four Section 1 private schools make up about 5 percent of the section, which has 78 member schools.
The Ursuline School, Albertus Magnus, and Keio Academy did not respond to The Record’s request for comment. Leffell School officials declined to comment.
Ursuline officials did, however, say in a recent post on the school’s website that not having postseason eligibility would be a loss for their athletes.
“At its core, this conversation is about fairness,” Ursuline officials wrote. “Fairness does not guarantee outcomes. It guarantees opportunity. Removing that opportunity from an entire group of students does not level the playing field. It narrows it.”
Even competing against private schools, Rye is still a proven Section 1 powerhouse.
In the last three years alone, 14 Garnet teams have won section titles, nine have advanced to state tournament semifinals, and five have won a New York state championship. Rye girls soccer and football both claimed state crowns in 2023 and 2025, and boys hockey won its first state title this March. Baseball, girls lacrosse, and boys lacrosse are currently looking to add to those totals, with each of the three teams competing in spring 2026 state tournaments this week.
But Reid says allowing private schools postseason eligibility is bigger than just one city on the Sound Shore.
“We do not choose our teams from students outside of the boundaries,” she said. “In fact, presently, Rye does not compete against Section 1 non-public schools in postseason in the majority of sports. With private schools, it’s not just about Rye, nor is it about just winning. It’s about equity.”
Albertus Magnus has long been a contender in Section 1, with particular success in soccer. The girls team has won more than a dozen section championships and four state championships over the last 30 years. Last November, the Falcons won the Class AA girls state soccer title in Cortland. Moments later, Rye came onto the same pitch and won the Class A state title.
The Albertus Magnus boys soccer squad has also won six section championships, and in 2006 became the first and only Rockland soccer team to win a state championship.
Louis N. Wool, superintendent of the Harrison Central School District and president of the Lower Hudson Council of School Superintendents, has been an outspoken proponent of disqualifying private schools from the postseason. He argues that many matchups between public and private schools are over before they start.
“It happens every season, in every section, across New York state,” Wool wrote in an editorial for Syracuse.com. “A student-athlete — a kid who has trained for years, who has poured herself into her sport, who has no choice about which school she attends because she lives where she lives — walks onto the field already knowing.”
Reid — who has spent 21 years in New York high school athletics, the last six of them in Rye — said equity for public school athletics has been a topic of conversation since she began her career.
“I would say in the last three to four (years), it’s really heightened each year,” Reid said. “Parents within our own communities… they are very supportive of the initiative to look at a separate classification at the state level for non-publics.”
Earlier in her career, she said, there was a movement to completely remove private schools from the NYSPHSAA, but it stalled because of the potential for lawsuits.
“We are not looking to remove completely,” Reid said. “What we are looking to do is allow these non-publics to be member schools and have the same benefits, providing a schedule playing a regular season component.”
A bill that would require public and private schools to hold separate state championship tournaments is now sitting at a New York State Assembly Committee. But Reid said Rye and Section 1 can’t wait for that legislation to go through another six rounds of deliberation before it is signed by the governor.
Instead, she said, changing the section’s individual constitution would expedite the process of allowing public school athletes a fair shake — and likely set an example for other NYSPHSAA sections that believe private school eligibility in the postseason is unfair.
“We’re not going to wait,” Reid said. “We’re leading this, and I think depending where things land, I think others are anxiously watching to see where things go.”
