News

At this time a year ago, The Academy for Sport Leadership conducted our first survey of the career pathways and satisfaction levels of Michigan high school coaches.

Survey Goals

When we constructed the survey, we had two purposes in mind:

1. To encourage current coaches in Michigan to pool and publish information about their own professional experiences; and

2. To find out from current high school coaches in Michigan the formal and informal pathways as well as the distinctive and shared journeys they take to become satisfied coaches.

Encouraging Response

We are pleased to say that 277 coaches responded to the electronic notice we sent to Michigan high school athletic directors, requesting them to encourage their school coaches to participate in the survey.

Of the total 277 who decided to participate, 99 were women and 178 were men. Among them, 75% currently hold or have held a paid coaching position for four years or more.

We are heartened by this inaugural response. Special thanks, as well, to all the coaches who took time to complete the survey. We appreciate the many thoughtful comments coaches included at the end of the survey. We are still processing all the rich information these coaches have passed on to us.

In the meantime, we want to make sure the survey's findings, particularly the key findings that are statistically meaningful, are published and available for the coaches who participated, and the public, for further review and discussion.

Initial Findings

Here are the survey's findings:

Coaches in the survey had an interest in joining the profession at a young age. Close to 60% responded that they first wanted to be coaches between the ages of 16 and 22.

TASL's seventh camp, held in June 2009 included Future Coaches Camp traditions, like the ropes course the first day and the whistle ceremony on the last. And in between, there were new mentors, skills and coaching's special practices and customs to our novice coaches learned about.

The TASL Class of 2009, like every other class we have had, was the best ever. Their energy, camaraderie and independence should inspire veteran coaches too. See the Class of 2009 doing more than learning the ropes. The video shows them becoming our coaches of the future.

At the end of each Future Coaches Camp each June, a small ritual takes place. The girls, soon heading to their homes around Michigan, get in a circle with their camp teachers. The circle offers everyone an opportunity to pass on what they have learned at the camp and to recognize what they admire about their fellow campers and anyone else from the camp, including teachers that they wish to have a shout out about.

This year, as in all other years since TASL's founding, one of the Future Coaches Camp teachers, Joan Cowdery, was in the circle. As Joan was one of the last to talk, there was no chance for anyone else to do a shout out for her on the valuable role she has played in helping young women have the confidence to coach.

So, here is our chance. The more relevant question is: what hasn't Joan done for TASL? Because she has done almost everything asked of her and then some, we'll mention just a few of her contributions over the years.

First, she is an accomplished organizer. She is the person who gets the faculty and activities we need for our camp. Not only is she a details person. Joan has a broad understanding of our mission. She ensures that some of the half-baked plans we have enthused about over the years, are grounded in reality. Finally, Joan could easily have made a career on Comedy Central. She is that funny, and her hilarious stories remind us that first and foremost, sport is play, and that sport leadership is mostly about teaching others to have fun.

At the same time, Joan has a serious streak. And it is clear that increasing opportunities for young women in sport is a serious matter to her.

Last year about this time, media and athletic community speculation about the solvency of the Michigan High School Athletic Association was as common as the speculation right now about the next giant to fall on Wall Street. Except that the solvency of sport organizations is minor compared to what is going on with the economy. And, to be sure there was no talk about a bail-out. There was a range of views on it all. Among them the view that the MHSAA just assumed, rather arrogantly perhaps, that they were going to prevail in their eleven year lawsuit and battle with the Communities for Equity group over gender discrimination involving girls' high school sports team schedules.

And then the MHSAA lost in the spring of 2008. The ruling against the Association had two immediate consequences:

1. It meant a change in high school sport schedules, perhaps the most significant one being that girls' and boys' basketball would be played at the same time, that is in the winter season.

2. It meant that the Association was ordered to pay $7.4M in legal fees, which according to one media report, was $1.5M more than the organization's entire worth. (http://www.mlive.com/news/index.ssf/2008/04/74_million_ruling_puts_michi...)

So, the ruling's aftermath is now in its second season. And at The Academy for Sport Leadership, we would like to know how it is going. We particularly want to know how it is going for the athletes. Yes, we know that it was not exactly popular. And that officials found it taxing...and that scheduling was difficult...and that facility space was limited. But the kids are still playing sport.

And as everyone in sport always claims, it is about the athletes first. Check in with us by joining our forum: Michigan Women's Sport in the News and let us know.

TASL was lucky to have Rebecca Chinsky as our 2007-2008 Intern. Chinsky herself did not rely on luck to get the TASL position: her hard work during high school and long hours of practice, however, did.

Rebecca hails from Baltimore, Maryland, where she was a three-sport athlete at her high school, a team captain of her soccer team, winner of numerous awards, among them the Sportsmanship Award for basketball and Most Valuable Player Award in lacrosse. Most significantly, she was honored two years in a row her junior and senior years as Female Athlete of the Year. And to top it all off, Rebecca was an academic star and involved in many community service activities, including work with her synagogue and in leadership and participating roles in the Maccabi Athletic movement.

At TASL, we first met Rebecca when she was a senior in the Division of Kinesiology program at the University of Michigan, majoring in Physical Education, when she applied for the TASL internship. According to Rebecca, what interested her in the position was our mission of "getting females more involved in athletics and a healthy lifestyle." 

And true to her word, Rebecca spent the winter months helping our President Meg Seng to market our sixth annual Future Coaches Camp in June and then stayed on to work at the camp, which attracted a small but dedicated group of exceptionally talented young women from around the state.