positive coaching

One of the new "missions" I am bringing for consideration at our church is how to help influence the values of youth sports adult participation in our community. I coached youth soccer for three years and presently Kate who is 15 has just finished a great experience of her 1st season on the Firestone High School girls' tennis team under the coaching of Craig Sampsell. Molly continues to play soccer and plays for the U13 West Akron United Soccer Club team and the U14 Greater Akron Premier team. The former is the team I coached from U9 to U11.

I learned about the book Catch Them Being Good : Everything You Need to Know to Successfully Coach Girls by Tony DiCicco, Colleen Hacker, Charles Salzberg through that experience. This is a great book beyond girls soccer. In watching not only soccer coaches but youth coaches in a few other sports, I have become very concerend about the messages we adults are communicating to the children. I have seen many wonderful youth coaches. But I have also seen some who don't simply have demanding coaching styles, but in addition a way that demeans the youth. I have seen this happen where the psyche of the child/youth is attacked for not trying hard enough or for having caused the team loss or a score by the other team. I have also seen coaches who in front of everyone present during a game continually deride and shame a player while the team is losing or not playing the way the coach wants. Some coaches continually try to direct the team during the game which causes the players to not be able to be focused on the game. The players wind up trying to pay attention to the dynamics of the game at the same time they try to pay attention to the yelling of the coach. A formula for loss. I don't care what Bobby Knight's record has been, it still doesn't mean its right. I have heard parents and fans say that the players need to get used to that style of coaching because they will run into that in the future possibly with another coach in sports or co-workers or bosses who are like that in their work.

If we justify or excuse this kind of coaching for youth, then why should we advocate at all in the world for any values of respect, peace, cooperation, and basic human rights for all people? I agree that the kids, unfortunately, will probably run into this behavior in their life, but we as adults should be doing all we can to make sure it doesn't happen to them as children, and to help them to learn how to develop appropriate boundaries and responses to such inappropriate behavior whether on a local youth sport field orin the halls of Congresss.

I have found a group called the Postivie Coaching Alliance. Local schools and sports clubs can have memberships in this group. I have contacted them about our church becoming a member. The exec director said they had never had that kind of request before. He sent me a copy of their core values and mission and told me to see what I thought about the mission of the church connecting with their purpose. I think it is a wonderful fit. Youth sports is probably one of the most active venues in our communities for the communication of and experience of the values and faith we believe in. I don't see this as a way to get people to join the church or to "evangelize" in the inappropriate way that is used these days to pressure people into "believing" in Jesus Christ. Rather, if we want to serve Christ in the world around us, here is one of the major playing fields. How can we help promote the core values of decent human respect and honor? Instead of trying to focus on individual coaches so much, we can help encourage a positive culture of sports participation and adult & youth behavior in the mission field around us. My vision at this point is for the church to become a center for the Akron area in promoting the Positive Coaching Alliance.

The national board for the Positive Coaching Alliance includes Phil Jackson of the LA Lakers, Herm Edwards of the NY Jets, Larry Brown of the NY Knicks, Summer Sanders - Olympic Swimming Gold Medalist, Bill Bradley former US Senator/NY Knick, Jack Kemp former US Rep/Buffalo Bill, Doc Rivers former prof basketball player/coach of the Boston Celtics, Nadia Comenci Olympic Gymnastic Gold Medalist, Bart Conner Olympic Gymnastic Gold Medalist, Dean Smith former Univ of NC basketball coach and winningest coach, Bill Walsh former Stanford Univ coach/SF 49ers Super Bowl winner coach, Joy Fawcett of the World Cup and Olympic Gold Medal US Women's Soccer team, Barry Zito Cy Young pitcher of the Oakland Athletics. These are only a few of the national board.

I also saw this week in the Akron Beacon Journal a special insert about the national "Character Counts" program for school districts which a number of school districts in the area participate in including the Akron Public Schools. They inlcuded a section on sports. The pillars of character counts were lifted up for school athletes and coaches. This fits exactly with the Positive Coaching Alliance purpose.

I hope we will be able to encourage a culture in youth sports that reflects this basic respect of the presence of God in each of us...particularly our children. I also believe we need to develop standards of accountability that transcend winning records for adult coaching behavior. Otherwise, in the world, those who win wars or have the most power in nations are justified by the behavior we condone in our own local communities to disrepsect human rights.