"When you try and do two things well, you end up doing both of them poorly, accomplishing neither" We are all over worked, we are all stretched thin, we are all here to help kids learn and achieve to their highest potential. Yet, set in an environment where this task is an uphill battle.
I LOVE sports; Football, Baseball, Hockey, Tennis, Basketball, Cross Country, Volleyball, Soccer. I also feel that sports play an important role in a well-rounded education and are a valuable part of the school's ecosystem. I am faced with a recent revelation and more important question...
If schools exist for education why do we allow, or even encourage the folks in-charge of education and leading learning to spread themselves thin by coaching one or even multiple sports? Why not separate out the roles? If you want to coach you can coach, but you can only teach .50 FTE, or not at all. If you want to teach, you can't coach any extracurricular activities. Now, this is a perfect example of a level 2 change, but I think that it is one that needs some serious discussion.
Education stands at a cross-roads where we can maintain the status-quo or change and raise the bar. All educational institutions have mission statements and I would fathom a guess that none refer to maintaining the athletic prowess of the school. I had an administrator that always asked the question:
Where do we hang our hats? If we hang our hats on sports than that is our focus and if we hang our hats on academics than that is our focus. You can't do both.
What do you think?
Since the early 1920s, sports influence within academics has grown. I would say the proportion of time has overwhelmed both the coaches and the students. This is related to success in sports while downplaying academic success. We see the AAU activities now even competing with school time as well as our weekend and worship time. And parents seem to not be able to say, "Whoa, let's think about this."
ReplyDeleteI know it is hard to accept, but developing a healthy awareness of recreation and sport in our students is not the same as the sports fanaticism that most schools have now a days. Students for the most part will not earn a living in sports nor will they most likely even be DI or DII athletes. Academics however yield citizens who can think and garner jobs as productive members of society.
We can't do both????? Why is it all or nothing? If we try to do two things we'll we end up doing both poorly. If this is true and if our time is spread so thin, why not only hire single teachers? This would eliminate bad parents or bad teachers. Teachers can either teach or parent. There is no way they can do both well. The teachers who have kids that live at home require a lot of time after school. We could only hire teachers with kids on a half time basis. When the kids are in high school we can hire them back to 3/4 time because they won't require as much time. Also, teachers should not be allowed to serve on committees for their community, church, be politically active or have a part time job because that would interfere with their ability to be a great teacher.
ReplyDeleteAll extra curricular activities require time after school, but this enhances the school experience. This time could be spent working a part time job doing anything but they are choosing to spend this time helping students achieve goals. This includes drama, Model UN, Swing/Show Choir, FFA, and any other extra curricular activity.
We all wear many hats in our lives.
I feel that coaching makes me a better teacher. To suggest that someone who coaches is automatically a poor teacher is offensive.
Chris: Being a coach does not automatically make you a poor teacher. When I was a student, I had some great teachers who were coaches, and I've worked with some great teacher/coaches in my 20-year career. But we have to take an honest look at the impact that sports are having on our schools, and whether it's positive, negative or neutral. Clearly, we're spending a lot of time, energy, money and creativity on our sports programs, and it's fair to ask whether those things are being sapped from our academic and arts programs, particularly when it's the same people in both areas. We should look closely at our schools and ask ourselves some questions, like:
ReplyDelete-- how much instructional time do our students miss due to athletic activities?
-- do absences tend to spike on the days after games?
-- do our coaches spend class or prep time working on their coaching duties?
-- are students pulled from class by coaches for individual or team meetings?
-- is physical education used for extra coaching time?
-- are coaches excused from parent-teacher conferences so they can coach?
-- is more attention paid to sporting achievements than to academic ones?
-- are coaches allowed to treat their players in ways that would never be allowed of a teacher in the classroom?
-- are sports programs really financially self-sufficient, as many communities are led to believe?
-- do student athletes report a lack of time for homework or other non-athletic activities?
-- do kids report feeling pressured to participate in sports against their will?
-- are practices getting longer and more frequent?
-- are seasons longer with more events?
-- are students required to train in the off-season, even "unofficially"?
I'm not suggesting that all schools have these problems, and I'm not sure I could find even one that had ALL these problems, but they're questions that need to be honestly addressed. Are sports part of our core mission? With all the other challenges facing our schools, can we afford sports programs as they are currently structured?
There was no suggestion at all that coaches make bad teachers. I have and do coach. Simply postulating that can someone be great at BOTH?
ReplyDelete