The Off-Season
August 20, 2013
“If you take the summer off, you might have some muscle memory left, but you’re not going to be in the same shape.” That’s what Pam Allyn, director of LitWorld, a nonprofit organization promoting literacy, told Associated Press writer Philip Elliott for a recent story focusing on innovative ways to avoid the “brain drain” during summer vacations.
This gets to the heart of two points the MHSAA has been making.
First, the State of Michigan should stop penalizing public schools that want to begin academic classes prior to the Tuesday after Labor Day. Whether it’s a week, a month or longer, there should be incentives, not penalties, for doing more of what’s needed – providing more time on task.
Second, even for extracurricular sports, where programs begin before classes start in the fall and often extend beyond the end of classes in the spring, there is a need to rethink the summer months. Students need to stay active in a variety of activities during the summer to stay more fit, to help to enhance their acclimatization during early season practices in August and prevent injuries throughout the season.
From a sports perspective, the best summertime investments are to focus on strength and conditioning more than travel teams and tournaments, on variety more than specialization, and on engagement with friends who make the time fun. These are the elements of the “Prep Rally” promotion you can read about here.
Transforming Coaches
October 12, 2012
Forty-two years ago this past August, I showed up at a high school near Milwaukee for my first teaching and coaching job. I remember being introduced to the football team just before the first practice, and then just 60 minutes later, on the field, I heard a player call me “coach.”
The next day I overheard one player say to another, “Coach Roberts said . . .”
In 24 hours, I had been transformed from Jack Roberts to Coach Roberts. And it gave me a very special feeling.
After parents (and sometimes before them), the coach is the most important person in the educational process of school sports. Good coaches can redeem the bad decisions that administrators or parents sometimes make; and bad coaches can ruin the best decisions of administrators and parents.
Coaches have enormous influence over how kids think, how they act and what they value.
There is no time or money better spent in school sports than the time and money spent on coaches education. Every coach, every year in continuing education regarding the best practices of supervision, instruction and sports safety, as well as in ethics, values, sportsmanship and leadership.
The MHSAA Coaches Advancement Program should be the centerpiece of every school district’s ongoing, multi-faceted training program for coaches. We expect continuing education for classroom teachers. Why would we ever consider less for those who work with large numbers of students in settings of high emotion and with some risk of injury attended by hundreds or even thousands of spectators?