"It's a mish-mash… we are what we are"

Abstract

This research examines how the Eastern Independent League (EIL), a interscholastic athletic conference composed of 12 private secondary schools in the New England region of the United States, attempts to organize athletic competitions amongst its members, and how these activities challenge individual school notions of institutional and athletic image and identity, as well as inter-conference management issues. This article reviews the constructs of organizational identity and image, specifically the notion of hybrid identity, and links them to the context of the EIL and American interscholastic athletics. The results of this study demonstrate that the mission and goals for individual member institutions created conflict within the league, and led to issues that challenged the management of the EIL and the future maintenance of the league's shared identity.