Athletics In Our Schools

[Michelle Andreoli]

I am the CSAC chair of a JK-8 catholic school in North York, last spring questions and concerns started arrising fro parents about athletics, more specifically the way try-outs were happening, some were about how older kids get cut from a team for a younger kid that is better. At our school there are mainly two teachers who coach the majority of sports (by their choice) there are a few others who coach a few sports, as well as a few parents. The parents would like to see some changes and more clear guidelines on what teams are for what ages, when try-outs are, when practices are. I have done some research on the TCSAA website reading the constitution, I have also spoken to the director of Health and PE at the TCDSB. Her advice to me was that all schools should come up with their own athletics philosophy, when I put this on the agenda for our CSAC meeting the teachers became very angry and defensive and told us that we have no right or jurisdiction over athletics end of discussion. Anyone have any experience or advice in this area???

[Mike Hunt]

No advice to give but can share that in our experience much of the same happens at our school.
ALL children are not treated equally nor given equal opportunity to participate. There is very little communication to the parent body regarding try outs, practices, etc. Athletics are given high priority and seem to be dominated by 2 teachers (one who has 3 children, all elite athletes at the school). They seem to pick and choose the best of the best, and that is how it is in the world I suppose; yet many children are being neglected and majority of families are not being informed. Our administration says that all information is communicated on the morning announcements and if the children are interested, they have to "listen". I myself have been at tryouts and seen certain children being told to "try again" (high jump for example) while others are given one chance only. When the teacher was confronted, yes, very angry and defensive over the lack of fairness. There are no guidelines at our school and our principal refers to how her hands are tied due to the "collective agreement" a little too much for our satisfaction.

[Michelle Andreoli]

Thank you Mike for sharing, sounds about the same as we are dealing with. The funny thing is I have 3 boys at the school, my eldest makes all of the teams and happens to be a younger child (gr 6) who bumped an older child (gr.8) off the intermediate boys team. My middle son was eligeable to join 3 teams last year and made all three as well, so I am having no issues concerning my own children, but am advocating on behalf of those who are being treated unfairly - at possibly the expense of my own children. I do know that according to CSAC handbook CSAC is permitted to advise the principal on any matter, and that we now have a say in what goes on and that the education system is accountable to us. I spoke with the head of Health, PE at the TCDSB, she said we need (and have the right) to get together as a group (parents, teachers, coaches, principal) and set an Athletics Philosophy for our school. Getting there is now the challenging part as we are facing such anger from the main teachers who coach most of the sport. I have a meeting with our principal this morning so we will see how it goes. I don't want them to quit what they are doing - overall they do a great job and we have a very good athletics program, like you it is first priority at our school, which I believe should be academics, and it is also first priority to win. I beleive we can achieve victory with a better balance of "fair play" and chrisitan values. If you read the TCSAA constitution it says that coaches must place fair play over the persuit of victory - this is one piesce of info I will be using in my battle - thos it shouldn't have to be a baattle I believe we should all be working together for the benefit of the children. thanks again for sharing.

Mike Hunt said:

No advice to give but can share that in our experience much of the same happens at our school.
ALL children are not treated equally nor given equal opportunity to participate. There is very little communication to the parent body regarding try outs, practices, etc. Athletics are given high priority and seem to be dominated by 2 teachers (one who has 3 children, all elite athletes at the school). They seem to pick and choose the best of the best, and that is how it is in the world I suppose; yet many children are being neglected and majority of families are not being informed. Our administration says that all information is communicated on the morning announcements and if the children are interested, they have to "listen". I myself have been at tryouts and seen certain children being told to "try again" (high jump for example) while others are given one chance only. When the teacher was confronted, yes, very angry and defensive over the lack of fairness. There are no guidelines at our school and our principal refers to how her hands are tied due to the "collective agreement" a little too much for our satisfaction.

[Gord Wyse]

I have no direct experience on the Elementary side. But I can comment on a few points.
“no right or jurisdiction over athletics end of discussion”. All school councils have right and jurisdiction to review and make recommendations to the Principal on any matters that concern the whole student population. This would include policy/guidelines on Athletics. What you have no right to do is query why a particular student was treated one way or another, or review the actions of one particular teacher. Beyond the theory let’s review what is practically happening. Most coaches do so on a volunteer basis as practices/tournaments happen after school hours. The worst case scenario for a coach is having to explain to every parent why their child did not make the team. This I expect is what they are defending against. In addition their ultimate “leverage” on the principal is to say that the pain involved in coaching this is not worth the benefit and stop coaching. Perhaps leaving the school with no teams. So where is the common ground? Like most issues it comes down to communication and understanding what is driving behavior. If you want a policy which could lead to coach’s decisions being questioned and reviewed all the time by parents- it is not likely going to happen. If you can use the Principal as the “facilitator” for discussion you can present what outcomes you would like to see(as you have done in your question) and have the coaches present what concerns they are guarding against. If you can then assure respect for coaches decisions but work together to outline philosophy and guidelines that everyone wants to see it should be a win/win.
Good Luck.

[Michelle Andreoli]

Thank you Gord for your input. The Principal did step up at the CSAC meeting a remind everyone that, just as you said, the CSAC may advise the Principal on any matter. The issue is not asking about any particular students and how they were treated, but more so the way in which try-outs are held - children are personally invited instead of any announcement made to give a fair tryout to all children who are age eligeable for said sport. As well older children are being bumped for younger, better children - this particularly happens in Cross Country and Track where there is not pool (age division for) for grade 2, I know you can have them on the team if you do not have gr. 3's to fill, but we bump children from 3 who want to run for faster gr. 2's. Now this was not happening with all sports, but with some. The other major issue is communication, children and parents don't know when tryouts are, how long they last (so when the team will be chosen), children are unclear as to whether or not they have made a team, nothing is sent home about when and during what period of time practices will run, and we do not get advanced notice of tournament dates (sometimes a few days only). We are trying also just to get more clear guidelines set out as to what teams are for what age levels, so that parents know that their child may try out for X teams. I also volunteer a lot of my time at the school, CSAC Chair, head of fundraising, driving to sporting events and even offered to coach (two teachers have a monopoly on athletics at our school - they rarely ask the parent community to help - it has been 28 years one teachers has run mostof the athletics), I do it for the children and to help our school be a better school, and being a volunteer does not give you the abiulity to do it your way only. With that being said we have made it clear we do not want them to quit, we do not want to dictate to them, we want to sit down and discuss the issues that continue to be brought up and see if we can reach some agreements that will make everyone happy. We had a very positive meeting with the principal today and are taking the approach of steps and he will be the middle man. He agrees that changes need to be made and that as a group we can get there. The two teachers have threatened they will quit if they are told what to do and he made it clear that if we can not listen to concerns of parents and take action when necesarry then we are not working for the greater good of the students. I feel positive after our meeting so we will see how this all turns out.
ThanksAGAIN.

Gord Wyse said:

I have no direct experience on the Elementary side. But I can comment on a few points.
“no right or jurisdiction over athletics end of discussion”. All school councils have right and jurisdiction to review and make recommendations to the Principal on any matters that concern the whole student population. This would include policy/guidelines on Athletics. What you have no right to do is query why a particular student was treated one way or another, or review the actions of one particular teacher. Beyond the theory let’s review what is practically happening. Most coaches do so on a volunteer basis as practices/tournaments happen after school hours. The worst case scenario for a coach is having to explain to every parent why their child did not make the team. This I expect is what they are defending against. In addition their ultimate “leverage” on the principal is to say that the pain involved in coaching this is not worth the benefit and stop coaching. Perhaps leaving the school with no teams. So where is the common ground? Like most issues it comes down to communication and understanding what is driving behavior. If you want a policy which could lead to coach’s decisions being questioned and reviewed all the time by parents- it is not likely going to happen. If you can use the Principal as the “facilitator” for discussion you can present what outcomes you would like to see(as you have done in your question) and have the coaches present what concerns they are guarding against. If you can then assure respect for coaches decisions but work together to outline philosophy and guidelines that everyone wants to see it should be a win/win.
Good Luck.

[Mike Hunt]

Doesn't it all just come back to accountability and transparency?
If information regarding team participation/try outs/schedules, etc. is not being clearly communicated to the entire school population (children as well as parents) and there is an "exclusive private club & by invitation only" precedent being allowed to continue (which is also the case at our school) then there is no transparency. If parental concerns and administration are being bullied by threats of teachers "quitting" because they don't get to have it all their way (which amounts to emotional blackmail) then clearly there is no accountability.
Let them quit I say and bring in new blood who will play fair and give ALL children equal opportunity to at least have the experience of showing up, trying out and giving it their best effort (and perhaps becoming motivated to train and work hard as failure is its own best reward) ....which is what "should" be happening.
The more I read on this website the more obvious it becomes to me that bullies don't just exist on the playground at our schools.
In this day and age there is no excuse that such information shouldn't be clearly posted on each school website as part of the monthly calendar (could even have a "Team Page" dedicatd for such a purpose) as well as included in school newsletters. Period. This is the "information age".

[Sheila Stewart]

Great to hear about the positive direction and support that you are getting from your principal now, Michelle!

[Michelle Andreoli]

Such a great reply Mike! This is exactly what was said in the meeting yesterday between myself, the vice chair and the principal - transparency and a monopoly on athletics! It states in the TCSAA handbook that coaches are to be mentoring another coach to learn the ropes, I asked our principal who will know what to do when these two teachers retire, they both started teaching in the 70's! Also it is not the 70's or 80's any longer, we as parents have the right to advise on any matter, the education system is accountable to us. Bullied is right! I said exactly that, people are afraid of these two teachers and of lodging concerns and complaints that it might be taken out on their child. So many people come to me as the CSAC Chair hoping for help because they are "afraid" to go directily to the teacher/coach, or worse yet over their head to the principal - though the principal (I feel) is very approachable. The good thing is I am not affraid, my children play sports and have yet to not make a team - I am puting them at risk through my efforts in this, but I believe that things definately need to be more transparent, more clear communication, and the "private tryouts" is over (that is one thing we have already put a stop to). You did make a statement about giving all children fair and equal opportunity to try out - that is also what we are asking for. We are not asking for equal playing time, fair playing time because we also have the issue that they take so many kids onto a team and take them to a tournatment and a handfull never get to play - my suggestion is that you o nly take as many as you can manage to give playing time to - again not equal playing time, but that everyone who is on the team and trained gets to play. The one teacher siad that they are just trying to help some kids develop for the following year. My reply was "great" then tell them they unfortunately are not on the team, but you would like them to remain at practices so that they can hopefully be prepared for next season. They will string these kids along at practices for two and three weeks and then the nite before the tournament tell them that not everyone will get the cance to play. I told them that this is just downright mean and in no way Christianlike! Again I guess we are coming down to transparency. We have good athletic teams at our school and our children often do very well at most events, we believe we can remain competitive yet be more fair and promote fairness and development in a christianlike way over the persuit of victory. It makes me sick that it seems to be all about control! Anyway we now have another meeting set up of the executive committee and the principal so I beleive we are going to make some headway!
Mike Hunt said:

Doesn't it all just come back to accountability and transparency?
If information regarding team participation/try outs/schedules, etc. is not being clearly communicated to the entire school population (children as well as parents) and there is an "exclusive private club & by invitation only" precedent being allowed to continue (which is also the case at our school) then there is no transparency. If parental concerns and administration are being bullied by threats of teachers "quitting" because they don't get to have it all their way (which amounts to emotional blackmail) then clearly there is no accountability.
Let them quit I say and bring in new blood who will play fair and give ALL children equal opportunity to at least have the experience of showing up, trying out and giving it their best effort (and perhaps becoming motivated to train and work hard as failure is its own best reward) ....which is what "should" be happening.
The more I read on this website the more obvious it becomes to me that bullies don't just exist on the playground at our schools.
In this day and age there is no excuse that such information shouldn't be clearly posted on each school website as part of the monthly calendar (could even have a "Team Page" dedicatd for such a purpose) as well as included in school newsletters. Period. This is the "information age".

[Jacqui Strachan]

Hi Michelle,

It sounds like the meeting with your principal was productive, and things are getting on the right track, no pun intendended :-) Sports programs can be very tricky for schools. Most programs require a teacher-coach to meet liability and insurance requirements, so if teachers are not interested or choose not to coach, it can limit the number of activities available. It is important, as Gord says, to find some common ground and try to find a reasonable solution that works for everyone.

One of the strategies that our school used to address parents' concerns about try-outs (and cuts) for school teams was to encourage more intramural programs. School teams are more competitive by nature, and there are often try-outs and 'cuts' involved, which can be hard on some kids, but which are also a normal part of sports activities. Intramural activities often can be run at lunch time, and can be set up so that they are open to all interested students. They are usually more fun-focussed and less high-pressure. Also, because teachers and kids are playing with other teachers and kids in the school, it can build more engagement and bonding within the school community. With less inter-school coordination, planning, competitive pressure etc., they are less demanding of teachers' time, and don't require sports 'expertise', so you may find that more teachers are willing to participate as coaches or team leaders. Our school ran intramural volleyball, basketball, and floor hockey with great success - many previously non-coaching teachers jumped in to help out, and when I dropped by occasionally to see the games, both students and staff were having a great time, while also learning new skills, teamwork, etc.

[Michelle Andreoli]

Thank you for your suggestions Jacqui. We in fact did discuss this possibility in the spring when the questions and concerns started coming up. At the same time we had also already begun discussing the possibility of a karate program one day a week after school (as our school also does not have any after school programs and parents have been requesting them for some time now). Again the two teachers who run most athletics said if you guys want to run other programs you can have the gym any time you want from May through June! They said they need and use the gym so frequently for sports that there was no free time to add anything else except at the end of the year. Again, another reason we are asking for change, there is no schedule set so that we could try to free up gym time - something we are hoping will come from our meetings. I really do not have a problem with children getting cut from teams, when it is fair, one example is we have a boys intermediate volleyball team, we also have a boys jr. volleyball team. Grade 7 & 8 boys were cut from the intermediate team for some grade 6 boys (one gr. 6 being my own son), we believed this was unfair because there is a jr. boys volleyball team that the gr. 6's can be on. It is situations such as this that we believe to be unfair, where there is truly no reason for what they are doing. If we had only one boys volleyball team and they decided to have tryouts for boys in gr. 5-8 - great, but not the case. Again, intramurals, and having more of them were discussed, but shut down because of lack of gym time. It is a frustrating situation to deal with, I thnk the good thing is the timiing is right, the principal admitted that complaints have been coming in for yearsand the teachers had always taken the same attitude - basically too bad. He believes it is now time for change and their attitudes are not acceptable, and that we will move forward in a eries of steps to be more transparent, have better communication (starting with an athletics bulletin board to be made and posted on the main floor so everyone can check what is going on and when). I want to again emphasize that we are not out to "overthrow" anyone, or "overhaaul the athletics, but just to bring forth change that includes more and better comunication, more transparency, and to remember to uphold the TCSSA constitution by "placing participation, effort, enjoyment and skill development above the pursuit of victory", and to "promote fair-mined, ethical play within his/her school's teams and towards other teams." I really appreciate everyones comments and suggesions, I am new to this site and I am finding it very helpuful already!

Jacqui Strachan said:

Hi Michelle,

It sounds like the meeting with your principal was productive, and things are getting on the right track, no pun intendended :-) Sports programs can be very tricky for schools. Most programs require a teacher-coach to meet liability and insurance requirements, so if teachers are not interested or choose not to coach, it can limit the number of activities available. It is important, as Gord says, to find some common ground and try to find a reasonable solution that works for everyone.

One of the strategies that our school used to address parents' concerns about try-outs (and cuts) for school teams was to encourage more intramural programs. School teams are more competitive by nature, and there are often try-outs and 'cuts' involved, which can be hard on some kids, but which are also a normal part of sports activities. Intramural activities often can be run at lunch time, and can be set up so that they are open to all interested students. They are usually more fun-focussed and less high-pressure. Also, because teachers and kids are playing with other teachers and kids in the school, it can build more engagement and bonding within the school community. With less inter-school coordination, planning, competitive pressure etc., they are less demanding of teachers' time, and don't require sports 'expertise', so you may find that more teachers are willing to participate as coaches or team leaders. Our school ran intramural volleyball, basketball, and floor hockey with great success - many previously non-coaching teachers jumped in to help out, and when I dropped by occasionally to see the games, both students and staff were having a great time, while also learning new skills, teamwork, etc.

[Gord Wyse]

Michelle, another important reason we keep the "gym schedule" posted is that we promote a lot of after school hour community use of the school facility which usually involves the gym. Your situation is probably more common that you think. It sounds like you are making progress. It would be great if you kept good notes and updated us on your progress- what works/what doesn't and any insights you have going through this process. I am sure many others will be inspired to tackle this issue(or help you along the way) if they see a process that works. Good job and keep us updated.
Gord

[Cathy]

Too many coaches fail to make the distinction between competitive and recreational sports in our schools. Both exist and require that parents AND students know the difference.
There should be no try-outs at all for a recreational or house-league sport. However when it comes to OFSAA sanctioned sports the expectations around tryouts needs to be communicated clearly. If it's not problems arise. Common sense tells us that the more competitive teams are a selection of those students demonstrating excellence in that particular sport skill.
Conditions in training and what happens if a person trying out misses practice too often needs also to be explained.

I've experienced parents complaining that while their child was at every try-out practice yet got bumped by a student whose parents took her away on a vacation to Hawaii for most of the pre-season try-outs and practices. That is clearly not fair but the vacationing student was a better player.

Also, kids in secondary depending on scholarships trump all the rest of the students. Something that isn't clearly explained sometimes.

Also, is it fair for a student to make a team in his/her victory lap(5th year)? If they've said in school just for sports? It's happening in my local secondary school. I have even heard coaches encourage star athletes to say for just one more year of schooling because of the prospects of having a winning team.

At the elementary level, when students may be getting their first taste of organized sports. Any student who wishes should try out.

In our elementary my kids were sorted out in their gym classes in primary by "the best" and "the rest" by the teacher.
The school council voiced their concerns and eventually the teacher stopped doing that.

Re: school councils having the right to speak up on this and advise. Yes, they do. I recall that the overseeing body also for school sport OFSSAA has, or used to have a parent representative on their executive....so that role has ramped up and parents not only have a right but right at the top level too.

[Michelle Andreoli]

Happy December to everyone, I thought I would just give everyone who was so helpful in this athletics discussion an update on where our school is on this. We have had a series of meetings - teachers/coaches and principal, and Executive CSAC committe and principal and we all just came back together in our first meeting since this all blew up in Oct/Nov. At this meeting there were coaches, assistant coaches, parent coaches and parent helpers along with the principal and the CSAC Executive committe. We pre-set an agenda and the Principal took the lead and spoke about the need for change - transparency in all we do as Principal, teachers, coaches, CSAC etc. He also spoke about parent involvement vs. parent participation. All coaches were asked to give a brief on how their teams are chosen, including age group eligability, how try-outs are run etc.. All sports were covered and the Principal followed wit questions of each coach or coaching team - such as why do you do this this way, or how did it work out to have these parents helping and finally, what can we (parents, principal and other teachers) do to support you. The principal finished the meeting by letting everyone know what the course of actions will be to enhance our athletic and non-athletic activities, 1) an athletics bulletin board has been purchased, it will be mounted outside of the gymnasium and will be updated with sports and intramural information, tryouts, practices etc. regularly by our Gr. 7 class. 2) We will have regular section in our monthly newsletter with athletic information, 3) We are currently working on our website and when it is updated and runnng it will have an athletics page that will be run by one of our teachers and some of our students, 3) we will have more parent engagment in our athletics program to help enhance the program - so we will be inquiring within our parent community if anyone has knowledge or expertise in any athletics and would be interested in coaching or helping there will be a contact for that, and finally there will be a committee created that will have its first meeting in January to start to creat the Athletics Handbook. These are great strides and I am very pleased with the leadership the principal is taking and that he sees this as a necessary process. We are still meeting much resistance from (especially) one teacher telling us we can not have intermurals and inter-school teams that it just is not possible with such a small gymnasium and so many activities, so this teacher believes we will have to choose. Overall this is great stuff! Thank you all for your help and advice and I hope I this also helps others!