ITA Learning Project - My Journey from Youth to High School Coach – Post #2

There is one large difference in becoming a coach at the community youth level and high school varsity – bureaucracy. Youth activities rely so much on volunteers they are usually just happy to get anybody, let alone somebody who knows the game. I was certified in CPR/AED and First Aid through work, so I at least had that, although in the early years of the club they hadn’t started requiring those certificates. Before I can have contact with the high school kids, I need a valid Pupil Activity Permit from the Ohio Department of Education. There are some courses/certifications that were no brainers – First Aid, CPR and concussion awareness. A biggie, however, is the Fundamentals of Coaching through the National Federation of High Schools (NFHS).  This is a mandatory training and is available on-line through the NFHS learning portal ($65).

This was a little bit different than the coaching basics I had for my US Lacrosse certification. Some of the new information is emphasis on conditioning and strength training, which becomes much more important at the varsity level than it is in a development youth league. There was a bit more information on the communication part, mainly by just adding the school administration and Athletic Director to the list of stakeholders on the communication tree. Since this course was for coaches of all sports, the info was pretty general – proper correction techniques, providing specific feedback, 3:1 positive to negative feedback. Much of this lines up with teaching techniques and is very similar to much of what was in the US Lacrosse classes, so although it wasn’t new, it was a good refresher.

Some of the delivery was a bit off on the course. Some of the assessment questions didn’t work. MANY of the assessment questions were poorly worded. I never noticed how bad many assessments are until I took the Intro to Assessments course in this program. But since I did, the questions kinda annoyed me. I found it ironic to be taking a mandatory course from the National Federation of High Schools that was pedagogical challenged. I sort of went off on the course during evaluation, not something I normally do. So, the long and the short of this course is I spent $65 that didn’t teach me much, but I needed to take before I can take the field.

Part of the Fundamentals of Coaching course is a Ohio specific module. That one was pretty much pure garbage. There was no content provided at all – it was simply a link to the Ohio High School Athletic Association bylaws concerning player eligibility, recruiting regulations and like. As much as I didn’t like the national coaching course, this was even worse. The assessment had questions like “Student A transferred schools after the start of the school year but before the season the want to play in starts. The transfer was due to a move by the family. When is Student A eligible to participate?” I know these are things that coaches need to be aware of, but that really falls on the schools and AD to manage. I hope I don’t get any kids on the field that haven’t been cleared by the AD. The technical glitches that plagued the Fundamentals course were in the Ohio-specific course, also.

The rest of my online training went OK. The Sports First Aid Course through the NFHS had a few of the bugs that I dealt with through the other courses. By now I had about 7 hours dealing with these classes, so my frustration was growing. I was in a hurry to get through these so I can give the district and state as much time as possible to approve my permit application, so I can be on the field at the start of the season.

I was a bit frustrated with the Sudden Cardiac Arrest training that I had to take. It wasn’t clear how I was supposed to certify that I took it. There were contradictory statements on the Health Department and OHSAA sites – that stuff bugs me. But, it’s a new law and everybody is working through the kinks. My main problem was that most of the presentation was a media presentation of how a coach reacted quickly to a cardiac emergency one of his kids had. The coach’s quick action of getting an AED on the kid saved his life. It was an emotional story, but it wasn’t training.  So much of the content was filled with telling the anecdote that the instructional value was cramped for time.

So, now I pretty much have all my NFHS/OHSAA training up to date and submitted to the district and the state. I’m just waiting for them to approve everything.  Since I had a bit of a lag, I went through the NFHS Lacrosse Coaches course. That was pretty basic and really a review of the material in my US Lacrosse certification. That got me an Accredited Interscholastic Coach national certification. I don’t know anything more that I did before the online course, but now I have another credential.

It’s starting to sink in how much I still have to prepare for the season. Next post will be about more US Lacrosse training and some of the open resources I’ll be consulting.  Practice starts in about 10 days.

(Remember, this reflection was written before posting date. The lacrosse season didn’t line up exactly with this class. Go figure.)