Small Steps
November 3, 2015
“You can’t cross a chasm in two small jumps.” I believe it was former British Prime Minister David Lloyd George who said this when advocating for a big leap forward for his country during the early 20th century.
Indeed, taking two small jumps when one giant leap is necessary is an ill-fated strategy.
However, I have found that a series of smaller steps to solve large problems is very often the most practical and politically-expedient approach.
For example, as we have enhanced coaching requirements, especially related to health and safety, we didn’t insist that all of the changes occur simultaneously, or immediately. One thing at a time, phased in over several years, made these changes possible.
My MHSAA colleague Rob Kaminski, our webmaster and publications coordinator who is also an MHSAA registered football and basketball official, once remarked, “Not all football plays are designed to score touchdowns; some are just intended to move the ball forward or to set up a bigger play later.”
Enhancing Public Health
August 29, 2017
Due to overuse injuries from sport specialization that is too early, too intense and too prolonged, youth may be increasingly susceptible to sports-related injuries; but school sports themselves have never been safer – for obvious reasons:
-
Equipment is the best it’s ever been.
-
Coaches have never been better trained in health and safety.
-
Practice and competition rules have never been more safety conscious.
-
Officials have never had more authority to penalize unsafe play.
-
Medical care and insurance has never been as available as it is today.
Our objective is not merely to keep making school-sponsored sports safer and safer year after year. In school sports – educational athletics – we also have the objective that students learn habits of a healthy lifestyle they can carry into adulthood.
In this way, school sports mitigates some of the damage of youth sports and contributes to the general good, to improved public health in America.
All that we do has that goal, and it’s a finish line we have not yet crossed.