The Illini Prairie Conference is a

high school A secondary school describes an institution that provides secondary education and also usually includes the building where this takes place. Some secondary schools provide both '' lower secondary education'' (ages 11 to 14) and ''upper seconda ...

athletic conference An athletic conference is a collection of sports teams, playing competitively against each other in a sports league. In many cases conferences are subdivided into smaller divisions, with the best teams competing at successively higher levels. Confe ...

in the

Illinois High School Association The Illinois High School Association (IHSA) is an association that regulates competition of interscholastic sports and some interscholastic activities at the high school level for the state of Illinois. It is a charter member of the National Fed ...

(IHSA), based in

Central Illinois Central Illinois is a region of the U.S. state of Illinois that consists of the entire central third of the state, divided from north to south. Also known as the ''Heart of Illinois'', it is characterized by small towns and mid-sized cities. Agri ...

. The conference comprises ten medium-sized and small high schools resulting from the merging of the

Corn Belt Conference The Corn Belt Conference was a high school athletic conference in the Illinois High School Association (IHSA), based in Central Illinois. The conference consisted of medium-sized and small high schools. History The Corn Belt Conference was original ...

and the Okaw Valley Conference. Conference athletics began in the 2017-18 school year.

History

Member schools of the Corn Belt Conference and the Okaw Valley Conference began discussing a merger after the announced departures of Eureka High School and Mahomet-Seymour High School from the Corn Belt Conference in 2014 and 2015. Principals of the ten schools voted unanimously in February 2016 to begin plans to merge the conferences. School boards of the ten schools approved the new conference in March and April 2016. Student bodies of each school submitted favorite names for the conference to the principals. Illini Prairie was selected unanimously by the principals. Paxton-Buckley-Loda joined the conference at the start of the 2020-21 school year after, making the move after St. Thomas More decided to play an eight-man football schedule. PBL had played in the

Sangamon Valley Conference The Sangamon Valley Conference was an IHSA-sanctioned conference in northeastern Illinois established in 1948. The conference hosts primarily 1A-2A schools. It was the first Illinois conference to host an Indiana high school, as South Newton of ...

since 1990. St. Thomas More remains a member of the Illini Prairie Conference in all other sports.

Olympia The name Olympia may refer to: Arts and entertainment Film * ''Olympia'' (1938 film), by Leni Riefenstahl, documenting the Berlin-hosted Olympic Games * ''Olympia'' (1998 film), about a Mexican soap opera star who pursues a career as an athlet ...

in 2021, left the Illini Prairie Conference to join the Sangamon Conference, Thus leaving the Illini Prairie Conference with ten teams in the Conference and 9 of them that play football, still leaving St. Thomas-More an 8-man football team.

Member schools

References

External links

{{Illinois High School Association Illinois high school sports conferences Education in McLean County, Illinois Education in Champaign County, Illinois Education in Livingston County, Illinois

History

Member schools

See also

References

External links