Voters wasted no time flipping Colorado’s classification process on its head during Tuesday’s Colorado High School Activities Association’s special session.

CHSAA’s Legislative Council voted 52-22, with one voter abstaining, on ADM-3, which will add a 1.5 multiplier to a member school’s three-year enrollment average. This will include member schools across the state with a “tuition-based enrollment model” or designated as “nonpublic” by the Colorado Department of Education.

Per CHSAA’s Legislative Council packet, “Programs in bracketed sports at schools that meet the above definition will be exempt from the 1.5 multiplier if they did not qualify for and win at least one postseason contest during the previous cycle.”

The new classification model will target full implementation for the 2026-2028 cycle.

A list of schools of impacted was not available, but private schools in the Pikes Peak region that could be subjected to a multiplier based on the language of the proposal include Colorado Springs School, Colorado Springs Christian School, Evangel Christian Academy, Fountain Valley School, Pikes Peak Christian and St. Mary’s.

During Tuesday’s meeting, which was held virtually and lasted 40 minutes, Jennifer Bradley, St. Mary’s Academy athletic director, spoke about the negative impacts this could have on some schools. St. Mary’s Academy, located in Englewood, is an all-girls school with an enrollment of 257 and competes in Class 3A.

With the 1.5 multiplier, their team would move to 4A. Bradley said their athletes, including cross country which won its division of the Liberty Bell Invitational on Saturday, would be impacted by this decision.

“It’s at that 4A level that we feel we’d lose the opportunity to be competitive,” Bradley said. “We’re not afraid of an equal playing field, but we are afraid of our kids losing that opportunity to experience that joy. If ADM-3 is supposed to undo a perceived advantage, that’s not an advantage that St. Mary’s Academy has.”