This article was in the KNoxville Paper on Sunday. It addressed the changing relationships between parents & coaches:
I thought I'd share it in light of several discussion that have be on here recently.
I would imagine that in Texas, where football is a religion of sorts (like I guess in Tennessee), it is just as bad.
“It’s wild,” former director of Knox County athletics Bob Polston said. “Some of these mommas and daddies are just plain crazy."One thing that is innuresting to me is being a volunteer for both sport related and non-sports related kid activities is the ability to partner with parents. It actually isn't, IMHO, something to avoid as a coach/leader/teacher/mentor/volunteer but something to foster the right way. I was at a seminar in Dallas several years ago on a "partnering with parents" conference for the volunteer teacher work I do (non-sports related, but viable in anything I volunteer for). The thing that made me laugh then sit and think hard for a good long while was when the speaker busted out stats to make his point on why it is important to foster parental involvement. The most eye opening was when he took one small jar of marbles and said "this is how much time a year you have available with the child including any extra curricular activities and if you were just the best, most involved volunteer out there... now let me show you how much time the parent has available with the same child...". Just then 10 teenagers wheeled out 10 carts full of jars with marbles. Made sense to me at that point that my influence had it's limitations in terms of pure opportunity, while a parent has 1,000 times the opportunity to do more or even undo anything I tried to do. My wife works as a Children's Curriculum Director and of course I volunteer at her place quite often. I also work at a children's book publisher so I get to volunteer there as well. I will tell you with no problem whatsoever that the worse volunteers are the ones who try to "rescue" kids from their own parents. They have the attitude that the Mommies and Daddies are indeed idiots and if it were not for them (the volunteers) these kids would have nothing in their lives when it comes to the area that they're volunteering in. Say math tutoring, if the volunteer believes that the parent cannot or will not help, they'll take on the 'tude that they, the volunteer, are the great savior in math for said kid.
And the kid picks that up quickly.
I can't tell you how much I dislike volunteers with said attitude. The parent may not be competent or have the tutoring skills to do the finer points in said math tutoring, but they certainly can *help* and should actually be included in the process. Some parents are actually scared because they are intimidated by some skill sets they may be lacking in. If I were coaching a little league team, I would never want to have each and every dad or mom to be former baseball players and throw the ball or hit the ball with college level ability (or above) in order to be involved in the experience. That would be plain stupid of me. If ever a select team coach or manager or a trainer tries to phase you out as a parent because 1) you think they must know more than you because darn it they look like a ex-major leaguer (and probably can trot out a resume that speaks to that) or 2) you give them the reigns because they require it, then run, not walk... RUN away! Look for anyone in any such endeavor to partner with you as a parent. You must be involved. The balance should be there in what you can do and what the coach/teacher/mentor/volunteer should fill out where you left out. And only to that boundary and no more. Never hand your kid over to the volunteer with a drop off mentality... *NEVER*!
We have a saying at our volunteer teacher group at my wife's place "No drop offs allowed". We want parents to stay for at minimum the first five to ten minutes so the small group leaders/teachers/volunteers can speak to them while the kids do other things to prepare for the day's activities. It's important to the volunteer to talk to parents in case there is something important to know about Johnny's week that may lead to his willingness to participate. Also if the parents has certain points that they've tried to instill in the child during the week that they'd like for the volunteer to reinforce, it is important to talk. If I were coaching, it would be no different. If a parent told me "Johnny hasn't been doing well in the area of *trust* lately, we're working on that at home more and more", I want to know so I can help reinforce that in my coaching time with the kid. There are tons of practice routines that I can use to teach "trust" so the kid hears at home and then hears it at practice and I would hope hears it at school.
Parents who do not wish to partner like that are wrong, if they want to rule over the coach/volunteer/teacher/mentor instead of partner with them, they are just like the parents that are highlighted in this article. I find most of those parents hard to work with and it takes a lot of effort to bring them along as a partner. A partner by the way that has the lion share of the responsibility, not me the coach or volunteer. Conversely any coach, volunteer, teacher or mentor in your kid's life that tries to ostracize you is seriously wrong as well. That goes for these cottage industry folks who run batting cages or instructional camps or select teams or have the drop off mentality and want you to go away. That is bad if not worse a situation as a over-indulging know-it-all parent and yes, I've seen them out there and I dislike them with a passion.
Find the balance if your a volunteer or a parent and partner with each other. When it is done correctly and appropriate boundaries are in place, the experience becomes one of seeing a child grow and have a lot of fun doing whatever it is you're teaching. But in the end, what the kid will say more than anything else many years later is how much fun they remembered having when "Dad and I..." or "Mom and I..." or "My Dad and Mom and I..."
Don't ever give that experience away because you think the volunteer knows more than you. Don't ever ruin it for those who want to help you as a parent either by thinking you know more than the volunteer. Partner with one another and see how great the whole thing will truly be.
