The Classic Lake Conference, sometimes just referred to as the Classic Lake, is the conference for five high schools in the west metro area of Minneapolis, Minnesota. Much like the divisions in professional sports, such as football and baseball, the Classic Lake Conference is one of many in the Minneapolis–St. Paul metro area that divide schools in proximity into different conferences (a few other examples are the Lake Conference and the Northwest Suburban Conference). The mission of the conference is to promote and recognize excellence by providing quality experiences for students in programs of academics, arts, athletics and activities. The Classic Lake Conference conducts its activities under the auspices of and in concert with the Minnesota State High School League.
The five member high schools are, Robbinsdale Armstrong High School (Plymouth), Edina High School (Edina), Hopkins High School (Minnetonka), Minnetonka High School (Minnetonka), and Wayzata High School (Plymouth). Until 1999, Richfield High School was a member but left because of declining enrollment and changing demographics. Until 2005, St. Louis Park High School and Robbinsdale Cooper High School were also a members, but left for the North Suburban Conference due to their smaller student bodies.
At a conference meeting, held November 7, 2008, the superintendents of four of five schools voted to remove Armstrong from the conference starting in the 2010-2011 school year. Despite having comparable enrollment to the conference's other schools, Armstrong has a lower percentage of students that compete in athletics. To facilitate scheduling of competitions, MSHSL bylaw states that a conference may not have less than five members. The original intention was to dissolve the Classic Lake. Armstrong, Hopkins and Wayzata applied to the Northwest Suburban Conference as a group. They were rejected, but Armstrong was later offered a spot as a single school. The other four then applied to the already huge Lake Conference, but were turned down.
The Classic Lake will disband following the 2009-10 academic year. Armstrong will join the Northwest Suburban Conference while Edina, Hopkins, Minnetonka and Wayzata will join Eden Prairie in the Lake Conference.
Like the Lake Conference, the Classic Lake Conference most likely derived its name from the number of lakes both in Minnesota and the southwest metro area of Minneapolis (such lakes could include Lake Harriet, Lake Calhoun and Lake Minnetonka to name a few, as well as the fact that Minnesota is the Land of 10,000 Lakes). Classic Lake was part of the Lake Conference until 1993; because of the size of Lake, it had been split into two divisions: Lake Red and Lake Blue. All of the Classic Lake's schools were all in the Lake Blue conference, except for Robbinsdale Armstrong; most of the remaining schools merged to form the new Lake Conference.
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