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Our Job

January 29, 2013

When I’m asked to describe the MHSAA’s job in a three-second sound bite, I say:  “Our job is to protect and promote educational athletics.”

Give me three seconds longer and I’ll say: “Our job is to protect and promote the values and value of student-centered, school-sponsored sports.”

Give me three seconds longer and I’ll add “. . . by raising standards for, and increasing participation in, educational athletics.”

And give me time to complete the thought and I’ll add that we do this through:

    • training for coaches, officials and athletic directors;
    • tournaments that keep sportsmanship levels high and both expenses and health risks low; and
    • telling the story to these groups: students and parents, school personnel, and the media and public.

We provide training and tournaments, and we tell the story of school-based sports.

That’s the job.  And it’s how we judge the “good idea du jour” that bombards our office.  We can’t do everything.  To do so would not be doing our job well.

Risky Business

May 19, 2015

At a time when efforts to promote student-athlete health and safety are more obviously than ever at the top of our daily to-do list, it may seem ill-advised to suggest that kids need more danger in their lives. But they do! And that’s the point of 50 Dangerous Things (You Should Let Your Children Do) by Penguin Books.

From mastering the perfect somersault (#3) to melting glass (#47), and from climbing a tree (#28) to walking home from school (#18), authors Gever Tulley and Julie Spiegler demonstrate two obvious but often overlooked points: (1) that most of us learn by doing; and (2) that a sterile, bubble-wrapped world teaches us less than one in which we are allowed to play with fire (#45).

After-school sports and activities provide safe and supervised danger. A place to learn new skills, meet different people, perform under pressure and test one’s limits. A supervised place to engage in life before going out in the less supervised real world.