The Michigan Mega Conference was a large high school athletic league comprising twenty-eight schools which disbanded in mid-2009, with its former members either becoming independent or forming their own leagues. Member schools were predominantly located in suburban Wayne County, Michigan, mainly in

Downriver Downriver is the unofficial name for a collection of 18 cities and townships in Wayne County, Michigan, south of Detroit, along the western shore of the Detroit River. The place is sometimes referred to as South Detroit. Etymology The name ...

. The other schools were located in neighboring

Monroe Monroe or Monroes may refer to: People and fictional characters * Monroe (surname) * Monroe (given name) * James Monroe, 5th President of the United States Places United States * Monroe, Arkansas, an unincorporated community and census-designate ...

and Washtenaw Counties. The schools were also members of the

Michigan High School Athletic Association The Michigan High School Athletic Association (MHSAA) is a service organization for high school sports in Michigan and is headquartered in East Lansing. It is a member of the National Federation of State High School Associations (NFHS). Unlike ma ...

and compete in the organization's post-season state championships. Depending on the sport, the schools were divided into three or four divisions.

Controversies

When the MEGA conference was formed in 1993, many schools were denied entry into the conference. The repudiated schools alleged that this was because of their large black student population, the founding schools "discriminated in the formation and operation of the league." Consequently, current member schools Dearborn Heights Robichaud and

Romulus Romulus () was the legendary founder and first king of Rome. Various traditions attribute the establishment of many of Rome's oldest legal, political, religious, and social institutions to Romulus and his contemporaries. Although many of these ...

filed complaints against the conference for denying their admission as members to the Office of Civil Rights (OCR) at the

United States Department of Education The United States Department of Education is a Cabinet-level department of the United States government. It began operating on May 4, 1980, having been created after the Department of Health, Education, and Welfare was split into the Departme ...

. OCR determined that the athletic league violated Title VI of the

Civil Rights Act of 1964 The Civil Rights Act of 1964 () is a landmark civil rights and labor law in the United States that outlaws discrimination based on race, color, religion, sex, and national origin. It prohibits unequal application of voter registration req ...

. The schools declined a resolution offered by the OCR and subsequently sent the subject to the

Justice Department A justice ministry, ministry of justice, or department of justice is a ministry or other government agency in charge of the administration of justice. The ministry or department is often headed by a minister of justice (minister for justice in a ...

in the summer of 1995. A resolution was succeeded by the eighteen founding members and the Justice Department to include the aforementioned schools and five others (Highland Park, Inkster, River Rouge, Ypsilanti, Ypsilanti Willow Run) encompassing an athletic conference of twenty five schools

2008 football alignments

Red

* Allen Park * Belleville High School (Belleville, Michigan), Belleville *

Dearborn Dearborn may refer to: People * Dearborn (surname) ** Henry Dearborn (1751–1829), U.S. Secretary of War under President Thomas Jefferson, Senior Officer of the U.S. Army during the War of 1812 Places in the United States Forts * Fort Dearborn, ...

Fordson Fordson was a brand name of tractors and trucks. It was used on a range of mass-produced general-purpose tractors manufactured by Henry Ford & Son Inc from 1917 to 1920, by Ford Motor Company (U.S.) and Ford Motor Company Ltd (U.K.) from 1920 to ...

* Southgate Anderson * Truman

White

* Carlson *

Edsel Ford Edsel Bryant Ford (November 6, 1893 – May 26, 1943) was an American business executive and philanthropist who was the son of pioneering industrialist Henry Ford and his wife, Clara Jane Bryant Ford. He was the president of Ford Motor Company f ...

* Kennedy * Lincoln Park * Redford Union *

Roosevelt Roosevelt may refer to: *Theodore Roosevelt (1858–1919), 26th U.S. president *Franklin D. Roosevelt (1882–1945), 32nd U.S. president Businesses and organisations * Roosevelt Hotel (disambiguation) * Roosevelt & Son, a merchant bank * Rooseve ...

* Trenton * Woodhaven

Blue

* Garden City * Highland Park * Inkster * Melvindale *

* Ypsilanti

Gold

Annapolis Annapolis ( ) is the capital city of the U.S. state of Maryland and the county seat of, and only incorporated city in, Anne Arundel County. Situated on the Chesapeake Bay at the mouth of the Severn River, south of Baltimore and about east ...

* Crestwood * Ecorse * River Rouge * Robichaud * Thurston * Willow Run

List of MEGA Conference state champions

Baseball Boys' basketball Girls' basketball Boys' bowling Girls' competitive cheer Boys' cross country Girls' cross country Football Boys' golf Boys' gymnastics Girls' gymnastics Boys' ice hockey Girls' soccer Softball Boys' swimming Girls' swimming Boys' tennis Girls' tennis Boys' track Girls' track Girls' volleyball Wrestling

Disbanding

The Mega Conference officially disbanded after the 2008 season after members of the league began to fracture off and form their own conferences, citing a desire to have more geographically centered leagues, as opposed to leagues more focused around the schools' athletic strength. There were 2 main conferences formed from the ashes of the Mega Conference, with those being the

Western Wayne Athletic Conference The Western Wayne Athletic Conference (WWAC), is a high school sports conference located in Wayne County, Michigan. It was formed in 2009. Formation and Expansion The WWAC was formed by 11 of the teams of the former Michigan Mega Conference afte ...

and the

Downriver League The Downriver League is an athletic conference for high schools in Michigan. It was formed in 2009 after the dissolution of the Michigan Mega Conference by schools in the "Downriver" area of Metro Detroit. In 2018, Dearborn Edsel Ford was brought ...

. However, a couple of schools chose instead to join the

Southeastern Conference The Southeastern Conference (SEC) is an American college athletic conference whose member institutions are located primarily in the South Central and Southeastern United States. Its fourteen members include the flagship public universities o ...

, while a few others chose to run an independent schedule. {, class="wikitable" , - ! Western Wayne Athletic Conference ! Downriver League ! Southeastern Conference ! Independent , - , Fordson , Melvindale , Monroe , Ecorse , - , Edsel Ford , Roosevelt , Ypsilanti , Highland Park , - , Dearborn , Carlson , , River Rouge , - , Belleville , Southgate Anderson , , Willow Run , - , Romulus , Woodhaven , , Inkster , - , Thurston , Allen Park , , , - , Redford Union , Trenton , , , - , Annapolis , Kennedy , , , - , Crestwood , Truman , , , - , Robichaud , Lincoln Park , , , - , Garden City , , ,

References

Michigan high school sports conferences High school sports conferences and leagues in the United States