HITW published August 8, 2015
The 2015-16 school year and athletic calendar begins with several area schools looking for people to fill coaching vacancies. As of press time, three area schools have head coaching positions open for winter sports.
One athletic director reported a member school in his school’s conference is looking for an athletic director and several coaches.
Why is this the case?
Dave Preheim, athletic director at Concord High School and president of the Indiana Interscholastic Athletic Administrators Association, said there are several factors which have made coaching less attractive to otherwise qualified candidates.
Preheim said it used to be teaching candidates applying for jobs, and they used to be willing to coach to give themselves an edge in getting hired over the other applicants. That line of thinking has essentially dried up in the 21st century
“(Hiring is) something that’s getting progressively more difficult, and I think there’s a number of things at play here,” Preheim said. “First of all, it used to be when people got in to the teaching profession, many of them got into coaching, and in some cases schools required it. ‘You know, if you want a job here, we need a cross-country coach, too.’ I think that trend has really tapered off.
“If you follow education issues, you know over the last 10 years the teaching profession has changed dramatically. There’s a lot more expected of, and required of, teachers. I think there’s a lot of people who feel they simply don’t have time to fulfill the requirement of teaching and coaching. Obviously there’s some who do it, but it’s getting harder and harder to do everything a teacher needs to do in the school day, then at 3 p.m. go down the hall, change clothes and be on the practice field at 3:15.
“So I think because so much is asked of teachers in the classroom, the tenure of the traditional teacher/coach isn’t as long anymore. They just don’t feel like they can do it.”
An ever-rising level of competition also plays a role.
“Coaching, especially when compared to 20-30 years ago, is much more of a year-round endeavor. It used to be you could coach from the beginning of November until sometime in March, then be pretty much done. And that’s not the case at all anymore,” Preheim said.
“Today, if you’re not busy as a head coach in the summertime, your team’s going to be behind when the next season comes around. What used to be a commitment of a few months is now much more a year-round thing.
“I don’t know of any school in this area that has increased pay as a result of this. We don’t pay our coaches to run a summertime, year-round program. But by the same token, I’d have some serious concerns if I had a coach who said ‘OK, this season’s done. See you at tryouts next year.’ So it’s almost like they’re expected to work in the summer time without getting paid.
“Now, most coaches do it because they love it. In most cases, pay is the last thing that comes up in an interview for a coaching job. The greater issue is time away from their families and time away from doing other things. I’m sure that’s part of it. but a coach can’t ask your student-athletes to give 100 percent and not do the same thing.”
Ahhh, yes. Time. The stuff life is made of. We’ve all experienced shorter summers for our children, and that affects coaching as well.
“In the old days of the teacher/coach, people thought ‘OK, it’s summer, I have time to take my team out to play in a tournament in the third week of June.’ Well, guess what? If you’re working at the school or a full-time job outside the school, you probably can’t take a lot of time off to take your team to a summer tournament somewhere.
“As you get fewer teachers in coaching, you get more who work outside the school. We’ve had it happen where a coach comes along and things are going great, then all of a sudden his work responsibilities change at his full-time job, and he has to resign their position as a coach because they just can’t make it work anymore with the job that pays the bills. So there’s a lof of factors that influence this situation.”
Some positions are easier to fill than others. Positions open at area schools include a pair of jobs for head wrestling coaches and one for a swimming coach.
“This is Indiana, and everybody knows everything there is to know about basketball, so finding a basketball coach isn’t that big of a deal,” Preheim said. “To find someone who has experience coaching divers, or pole vaulters, is really hard. So we ask around; ‘do you know anyone who can do this?’
“And there’s no envy among A.D.s; we all know how hard it is to find someone to coach those more specialized things. It’s pretty hard to grab a warm body and say ‘go out and coach pole vault.’ If you don’t have someone with experience teaching the athletes, well, it’s already a pretty dangerous activity.”
Expectations from the parents of student-athletes, especially among schools used to a high level of success on the field, can occasionally deter coaches from applying for jobs.
“I’ve heard of a school in the central part of the state that recently had a football coach opening,” said Preheim. “And it was a school with an enormous amount of tradition. I heard they had six applicants.
“There are places in the state where if the football coach goes 7-4, they ought to keep their realtor on speed dial. And there are places where if you go 7-4 they’d give the coach a key to the city.”
Preheim also said discussions between parents and coaches over playing time, the plays run or techniques taught can be a sore spot. In the Information Age, the level of knowledge expected of coaches can often be unrealistic.
“There is a misconception that when there’s a coaching opening, there’s 10 applicants who each have 20 years experience and have won at least seven state championships,” Preheim said. “The reality is maybe we have zero applicants, or one applicant. Sometimes you have a great pool from which to choose, sometimes you don’t.
“I’d love to have people with those kinds of credentials lined up outside my office door all the time, but it doesn’t always happen that way.”
So what’s an athletic director to do? The business buzzword for it is “networking,” asking anyone who might be able to provide a lead from someplace.
“There might be a situation where I’m looking for a coach and I know someone nearby just hired someone, so I’ll ask “hey, did you have more than one applicant? If so, who were the rest of them?’” Preheim said. “Sometimes we’ll put ads in the paper, or we’ll ask our coaches if they know anybody.
“Basically, there are times when we’ll use any lead we get from anywhere.”
As pressures rise for adults to perform well at their day jobs, especially teachers, finding well-qualified coaching candidates may become even more difficult, according to Preheim.
“It’s not at a crisis level yet, but I expect with every year that goes by it’ll become a bigger issue.”
One athletic director reported a member school in his school’s conference is looking for an athletic director and several coaches.
Why is this the case?
Dave Preheim, athletic director at Concord High School and president of the Indiana Interscholastic Athletic Administrators Association, said there are several factors which have made coaching less attractive to otherwise qualified candidates.
Preheim said it used to be teaching candidates applying for jobs, and they used to be willing to coach to give themselves an edge in getting hired over the other applicants. That line of thinking has essentially dried up in the 21st century
“(Hiring is) something that’s getting progressively more difficult, and I think there’s a number of things at play here,” Preheim said. “First of all, it used to be when people got in to the teaching profession, many of them got into coaching, and in some cases schools required it. ‘You know, if you want a job here, we need a cross-country coach, too.’ I think that trend has really tapered off.
“If you follow education issues, you know over the last 10 years the teaching profession has changed dramatically. There’s a lot more expected of, and required of, teachers. I think there’s a lot of people who feel they simply don’t have time to fulfill the requirement of teaching and coaching. Obviously there’s some who do it, but it’s getting harder and harder to do everything a teacher needs to do in the school day, then at 3 p.m. go down the hall, change clothes and be on the practice field at 3:15.
“So I think because so much is asked of teachers in the classroom, the tenure of the traditional teacher/coach isn’t as long anymore. They just don’t feel like they can do it.”
An ever-rising level of competition also plays a role.
“Coaching, especially when compared to 20-30 years ago, is much more of a year-round endeavor. It used to be you could coach from the beginning of November until sometime in March, then be pretty much done. And that’s not the case at all anymore,” Preheim said.
“Today, if you’re not busy as a head coach in the summertime, your team’s going to be behind when the next season comes around. What used to be a commitment of a few months is now much more a year-round thing.
“I don’t know of any school in this area that has increased pay as a result of this. We don’t pay our coaches to run a summertime, year-round program. But by the same token, I’d have some serious concerns if I had a coach who said ‘OK, this season’s done. See you at tryouts next year.’ So it’s almost like they’re expected to work in the summer time without getting paid.
“Now, most coaches do it because they love it. In most cases, pay is the last thing that comes up in an interview for a coaching job. The greater issue is time away from their families and time away from doing other things. I’m sure that’s part of it. but a coach can’t ask your student-athletes to give 100 percent and not do the same thing.”
Ahhh, yes. Time. The stuff life is made of. We’ve all experienced shorter summers for our children, and that affects coaching as well.
“In the old days of the teacher/coach, people thought ‘OK, it’s summer, I have time to take my team out to play in a tournament in the third week of June.’ Well, guess what? If you’re working at the school or a full-time job outside the school, you probably can’t take a lot of time off to take your team to a summer tournament somewhere.
“As you get fewer teachers in coaching, you get more who work outside the school. We’ve had it happen where a coach comes along and things are going great, then all of a sudden his work responsibilities change at his full-time job, and he has to resign their position as a coach because they just can’t make it work anymore with the job that pays the bills. So there’s a lof of factors that influence this situation.”
Some positions are easier to fill than others. Positions open at area schools include a pair of jobs for head wrestling coaches and one for a swimming coach.
“This is Indiana, and everybody knows everything there is to know about basketball, so finding a basketball coach isn’t that big of a deal,” Preheim said. “To find someone who has experience coaching divers, or pole vaulters, is really hard. So we ask around; ‘do you know anyone who can do this?’
“And there’s no envy among A.D.s; we all know how hard it is to find someone to coach those more specialized things. It’s pretty hard to grab a warm body and say ‘go out and coach pole vault.’ If you don’t have someone with experience teaching the athletes, well, it’s already a pretty dangerous activity.”
Expectations from the parents of student-athletes, especially among schools used to a high level of success on the field, can occasionally deter coaches from applying for jobs.
“I’ve heard of a school in the central part of the state that recently had a football coach opening,” said Preheim. “And it was a school with an enormous amount of tradition. I heard they had six applicants.
“There are places in the state where if the football coach goes 7-4, they ought to keep their realtor on speed dial. And there are places where if you go 7-4 they’d give the coach a key to the city.”
Preheim also said discussions between parents and coaches over playing time, the plays run or techniques taught can be a sore spot. In the Information Age, the level of knowledge expected of coaches can often be unrealistic.
“There is a misconception that when there’s a coaching opening, there’s 10 applicants who each have 20 years experience and have won at least seven state championships,” Preheim said. “The reality is maybe we have zero applicants, or one applicant. Sometimes you have a great pool from which to choose, sometimes you don’t.
“I’d love to have people with those kinds of credentials lined up outside my office door all the time, but it doesn’t always happen that way.”
So what’s an athletic director to do? The business buzzword for it is “networking,” asking anyone who might be able to provide a lead from someplace.
“There might be a situation where I’m looking for a coach and I know someone nearby just hired someone, so I’ll ask “hey, did you have more than one applicant? If so, who were the rest of them?’” Preheim said. “Sometimes we’ll put ads in the paper, or we’ll ask our coaches if they know anybody.
“Basically, there are times when we’ll use any lead we get from anywhere.”
As pressures rise for adults to perform well at their day jobs, especially teachers, finding well-qualified coaching candidates may become even more difficult, according to Preheim.
“It’s not at a crisis level yet, but I expect with every year that goes by it’ll become a bigger issue.”