High school football programs in Oregon will kick off the 2016 season with a focus on coaching education and student-athlete safety through USA Football’s Heads Up Football® program.

Beginning Feb. 13, USA Football will conduct more than one dozen Heads Up Football Player Safety Coach clinics across Oregon. The Oregon School Activities Association (OSAA) is the country’s first state high school activities association to require its member schools’ football coaches to enroll in USA Football’s Heads Up Football program for the 2016 season.

Heads Up Football establishes nationally endorsed standards rooted in the best available science.

Heads Up Football is a comprehensive approach to teach and play the No. 1 participatory sport of U.S. high school boys. Supported by the American College of Sports Medicine, the National Athletic Trainers’ Association and the American Medical Society for Sports Medicine, the program teaches tackling and blocking techniques designed to reduce helmet contact while addressing all-sport-relevant topics with Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) concussion recognition and response; sudden cardiac arrest protocols; hydration and heat preparedness; and instruction on proper helmet and shoulder pad fitting.

More than 1,100 high schools and nearly 70 percent of U.S. youth football leagues registered for Heads Up Football in 2015 for smarter, safer play.

Each OSAA member school will designate one Player Safety Coach (PSC) from its football coaching staff. PSCs will be trained by USA Football to guide, direct and monitor the program’s implementation as well as lead in-person training for fellow coaches, parents and student-athletes.

"The OSAA is excited to partner with USA Football in implementing the Heads Up Football program,” said Tom Welter, executive director of the OSAA. “Our primary goal is always to try to ensure the health and safety of our student-athletes. This educational program will provide all of our coaches with the knowledge, the training, the skills and the techniques to teach the game of football with safety as the top priority."

Dr. Michael Koester, chairperson of the OSAA Sports Medicine Advisory Committee and former chair of the NFHS Sports Medicine Advisory Committee, says the Heads Up Football requirement in Oregon is logical considering in 2008 OSAA became the first state high school activities association to prohibit same day return to play for athletes with a suspected concussion.

"The really exciting thing about this program is that what happens at the high school level will spread throughout the youth programs in each community,” Koester said. “This will allow kids to develop their skills in a culture that shares the same language, same techniques and same safety standards from grade school through high school."

“The OSAA’s commitment to its football student-athletes is exceptional and ground-breaking,” USA Football CEO Scott Hallenbeck said. “As the first state high school association requiring its member schools to employ our medically endorsed Heads Up Football program, the OSAA shares our highest priority of advancing player safety through the best available science. Coaches are teachers. Supporting them with education is a powerful catalyst to change for the better how players are taught and safety is addressed.”