Happy February, coaches. For those of you at the scholarship level, I hope Signing Day was a fruitful and exciting day! Those of us at the Division III level will keep plugging away to secure our classes.
My February thoughts are varied, but hopefully relevant. We’re experiencing an extremely snowy winter here in the Northeast, which has led to A LOT of time outside shoveling and clearing snow. Fortunately, I get a lot of thinking done during those times!
I’ve spent a lot of time reflecting on community involvement, and how it can be mutually beneficial to your program and your campus/town/region. I’m not going to provide a list of ways to “get involved”, as there are already a ton of great examples out there. I’d rather look at this topic from other angles.
For starters, I think it’s critical to be “accessible”. I mean this in the most simple way possible. There are a lot of programs out there who simply expect fans to gravitate to their program. I think we can all agree that a large, enthusiastic crowd helps your team. But what are you doing to ensure that the large, enthusiastic crowd is there? Visit hospitals, elementary schools, food banks, or anywhere else you can connect with the community outside the boundaries of your campus. Host events where the public has a chance to meet your players. It really doesn’t matter what you do, but do something to give folks a reason to care about your program.
While you’re working on reaching out, don’t forget about the students! Are you building a program culture where the students are important and involved, or is your program isolated from the general student body? On college campuses across our great nation, there are varying degrees of division between students and student-athletes. Regardless of level, especially in the current climate of facility upgrades and the like, there can be a belief that “athletes get everything”. This is a popular misconception, and it breeds resentment. WE know our athletes are great kids who work extremely hard, but the general student body may not know that. Encourage your players to be involved with campus activities. All too often, athletes live together, eat together, and study together. Take steps to immerse them in the campus community. Additionally, find ways to encourage support from the students. Free admission, free concessions, contests, etc. are all effective ways to inspire a loyalty to your program from the student body.
Finally, connect with your own department. Encourage interaction among teams. I’m currently working with some of our other coaches to come up with events where ALL athletes are involved, and get to know each other. Whether it’s some kind of a cook-off, or a trivia contest, or anything else you can come up with, it’s important to foster an environment where athletes know and support one another.
As coaches, we’re always looking for speakers to address our teams. Why not look more closely at your own department? Identify something in each program that you feel the coach does well. Maybe you’ve been impressed with your basketball team’s mental toughness. Ask the basketball coach to talk to your team about it. Many of our athletic departments have tremendous motivational speakers already on the payroll, and I think a lot of other coaches would love to share their time and insights with your kids.
As always, I welcome any and all feedback. I can be reached at wrussell@norwich.edu.