Chain of command differs by district

Accompanying sidebar for "A coach's story," from April 29, 2012.

As a high school coach, there is very little recourse in fighting for your job.

You play out your season, get evaluated by your administrators and annually face a school board vote that determines whether you will be welcomed back.

In smaller towns like Marshfield and Crane, the tightrope clearly is more daunting.

"In smaller communities, a lot of the decisions are made just by school boards," said Bill Brown, who has coached Parkview's boys' basketball team for 10 seasons after two years at Class 2 Richland. "One of the biggest positives, with (Springfield Public Schools), your immediate supervisors have a lot more say (in a coach's evaluation).

"I can honestly say I haven't met all of our school board members."



Most high school coaches have the same strategy for warding off complaints from parents and others in the community with high expectations.

Coaches conduct a preseason meeting with parents, outlining their program.

Then, throughout the season, the coach handles discussions on a case-by-case basis, often sending issues up the chain of command to the athletic director, principal and then superintendent.

But Rob Miller, co-owner of the national Proactive Coaching, LLC, a company that mentors coaches, said the policy isn't usually the problem.

"Sometimes the chain of command is not communicated, and you have 100 different people listening to them (parents)," Miller said. "There are times that parents do need to go talk to people, but the (lack of chain of command) creates so many of your problems. There are different venting systems."

Miller said the issues have crept into the college ranks.

"My belief is it started a lot with the AAU coaching one way and the high school coach coaching one way, primarily over the last 10-15 years," he said.

At SPS, about 300 coaching positions are maintained through athletic director Mark Fisher's office. Crane, for instance, has 21 athletic coaching positions in the district.

In that sense, SPS has many luxuries, including the ability to hire more young coaches as assistants, giving them a chance to develop. In addition, Fisher can bring in more training for coaches every few years.

Smaller districts, however, don't often have room in their budgets for much training. But, as Rogersville athletic director Rod Gorman said, mentoring is key in a district its size.

"To have a mentor is a lot easier for that coach to make changes," said Gorman, also the boys' basketball coach at Rogersville. "They're not viewing it as an authority figure."

As an administrator, Gorman said he addresses problems whenever they surface.

However, he said he stays away from coaches during their season when it comes to complaints from parents about their student-athletes' playing time or other thorny issues.

"We've hired them to do a job," Gorman said. "We take the common-sense approach. It's a very hard profession and we're not trying to make it harder."

The Missouri State High School Activities Association does not require training for current coaches. The association requires coaches without a full teaching certificate to complete a coaching principles class prior to first approval of a head varsity coach.

Fisher said it's important that coaches don't receive any surprises in year-end evaluations, saying he works with coaches throughout the season on issues.

"What's more important, is what's allowing your program to be successful," he said. "When we evaluate the coaches, it's about the engagement with the program. When participation numbers start to dwindle, that's a (bad) sign. Also, are our resources in line to allow our coaches to be successful?"

Not all bad

Despite the negative stories around the region this spring, there are plenty of positive ones out there in the Ozarks about coaches ending successful long careers, and healthy parent-coach relationships, even with intense and demanding coaches.

Gary Stanfield stepped away from Republic after 39 years of coaching. A two-time all-state senior, Nick Yocum, signed Thursday with Southwest Baptist University in Bolivar. His mother, Kris, said she knows it wouldn't be possible without Stanfield's dedication.

"Absolutely not," Kris Yocum said. "He pushed Nick and taught Nick how to be a man on and off the floor. He told him what he needed to do.

"Gary's a class act. He's a perfectionist and taught the kids how to do things the right way. He drove them nuts sometimes because he has high expectations. But he's not vulgar, and he's just tremendous."
 

Hired help

About five years ago, Springfield Public Schools brought in Proactive Coaching, LLC for a session with all of its coaches. It was used as a professional development day for the coaches, which are only able to be organized with all of the district's coaches every few years.

There, co-owners Bruce Brown and Rob Miller covered sessions including first-aid training to dealing with student athletes and parents.

"The most successful programs you find, the first step is to allow the student athlete to take care of the problem. That allows trust to develop between the coach and the player," said Miller, who lives in Liberty and is the commissioner of the Wolverine-Hoosier Athletic Conference. "When we allow the athlete to take care of it (by dealing with the coach one-on-one), it betters them for life."

The company, which has done workshops across the country, uses data gathered from player surveys from Brown's long coaching career at several different levels of sports in the Seattle area.

"Parents are spending a lot of money in youth sport, and are looking on a return on investment. There are very few kids that are getting scholarships. Maybe they should look at the investment being becoming a better person. In a lot of ways, coaching has lost that, parents have lost that."

SPS athletic director Mark Fisher said he'd like to bring more training back to his coaches, and would be willing to partner with smaller districts in the area to bring back the program.

Miller said one of the largest parts about their business is mentoring coaches after they meet with them in such sessions.