On August 6, 2020, the Pennsylvania Department of Health (PDH) and PA Department of Education (PDE) jointly recommended that Pre-K–12 school and recreational youth sports be postponed until at least Jan. 1, 2021, to protect children and teens from COVID-19.

The Wolf administration is providing this strong recommendation and not an order or mandate. As with deciding whether students should return to in-person classes, remote learning, or a blend of the two this fall, school administrators and locally elected school boards should make decisions on sports.

Highlights of the recommendation to pause youth sports until Jan. 1, 2021:

• Applies to team and individual, school and non-school recreational youth sports;
• Includes competitions, intramural play and scrimmages;
• Continue conditioning, drills and other training activities on an individual basis;
• Does not apply to collegiate and professional sports;
• Gathering limits remain unchanged – no more than 25 persons may gather indoors and 250 outdoors.

The administration is updating existing sports guidance to reflect this recommendation.

Reacting to the recommendation, the PA Interscholastic Athletic Association released a statement that said the association will meet on August 7th to review the recommendation. That statement can be accessed by clicking here.

To read the press release in its entirety, please click here.

For access to the sports guidance, click here.

For access to the guidance for schools, click here.