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Thinking Inside The Box

October 5, 2012

Praise is often heaped upon the innovative person who thinks “outside the box.”  But thinking “inside the box” is equally praiseworthy.

By this I mean doing the essentials better.  I mean remembering our first and fundamental reasons for being, and delivering the very finest services that support those purposes.

It is possible that by thinking outside the box, some organizations forget about their reasons for being; and in interscholastic athletics, we would be well served to think inside the box.

In sports we learn we must compete within the confines of end lines and sidelines.  Go beyond the boundary lines and you’re out of play, where you can’t score and can’t win.

If school sports will secure a victory for its future – meaning, school sports continue to be a tool for schools to reach and motivate young people in an educational setting – it will not occur from out of bounds.  It will occur because we stayed within prescribed boundaries:  local, amateur, educational, non-commercial, sportsmanlike and physically beneficial.

Community Development

April 1, 2015

When those who lead, manage and deliver school sports do their jobs well, the whole child – body, mind and spirit – is educated. Students learn to lead, and they learn to follow. They learn to become good team captains and good teammates.

When the job is done well, we place good sports on the path to becoming great citizens. We elevate both school spirit and GPAs. We lower dropout rates and discipline problems.

When the job is done well, school sports is an essential component of school improvement, as well as of the community building and place making strategies that every progressive city and town in Michigan is thinking about.

Successful schools are the ones in the center of community life; and when the job is well done, school sports programs are central to the life of those schools.

Building a school program without sports is like constructing the physical school building without the mortar that holds things together. Building a community without comprehensive schools is just as foolish.