To the Editor:

Coaches: Bring the social value back to high school sports and Stop making winning your primary goal! You create the culture-if you are all about winning, and too intense, your kids will play tight and stressed out, due to the fear of failure and making mistakes.

You will actually win less because of this. Not only that, but you rob the kids of the enjoyment of the game and cause them dissatisfaction both with themselves and others. Remember-you are a teacher-you must not be driven by your own ego and pride and put it aside; put the welfare of your individual players first and help each and every child become successful!

High school sports are meant to provide both fun and opportunity for kids to gain experience and knowledge that cannot be attained from academics. With that being said, coaches of high school sports need to make the following their goals/priorities (according to the Positive Coaching Alliance):

Assist players in challenging themselves to develop skills and improving overall health through fitness while getting maximum enjoyment out of doing something they love.

Help them grow as individuals to help make them better people as a whole-not just better players. Teach them important/valuable life lessons such as playing as a team, sacrificing individual needs, handling adversity/failure, mastering fear/obstacles, gaining self-confidence/improving self-esteem, developing character, discovering individuality, forming friendships and deepening school/community connection.

Give all players on the team a role/responsibility that best fits their physical/mental abilities and help them gain the skills needed to fulfill their duties as best they can. Stress their importance to the success of the team!

All players need a significant, not equal, amount of game time to fully master a skill/concept. The purpose of practicing and learning the game is so they can eventually execute what they have learned in a game-if not given the opportunity/experience to do this several times in games, they will never develop to their full potential.

It is the job of the coach to get creative with substitutions and balancing abilities and to not simply play the same players the whole game. Put a few strong players with a couple of weaker players and let the weaker players learn from the stronger.

Recognize the skills of the players on the opposing teams and match their abilities with players on your team. This allows all of the them the opportunity to be challenged and successful.

Providing significant game time for all players will help close the gap in ability levels; if the weaker players are not given game time, the gap will remain the same.

The more the weaker players are involved, the more energy they will give both at practices and from the bench, due to the expectation to see game time.

Very few, if any, kids join high school sports with the goal of making it their professional career, and when asked, most all would rather be an active participant on a losing team, than sitting bench on a winning team.

Kids’ Top 2 Reasons for Playing High School Sports:
• To have fun.
• To be with friends.

Kids’Top 5 Reasons for Low Participation Numbers and/or Quitting High School Sports:
• Too much pressure to perform from the coach.
• Enjoyment of the game is lost.
• Too much emphasis on winning.
• Too competitive.
• Perceptions of not being good enough.

Erika Rowe
Russell