Educator-Coach as Stranger

Foundations of Freedom/Domination

Sport on college campuses was an exercise in student freedom. Influenced by faculty control of the university (i.e., the curriculum, rules, prayer), student apathy and rebellion ensued throughout the 19th century (Smith, 1988). Like other extracurriculars such as debate and fraternities/sororities, students organized, participated, and even coached sports on college campuses, much like today’s intramural leagues. Students benefitted through a liberating experience of the body, socializing, and community ritual. While sport was played between classes (i.e., freshman vs. sophomores) from the early to mid-19th century, by the end of the century sport had transformed into the early workings of intercollegiate athletics signified by competition and commercialization.

The first intercollegiate contest, funded and marketed (commercialized) by a local railroader, was a crew match between Yale and Harvard in 1852 (Smith, 1988). As commercialization and profits blossomed, and the desire to beat one’s rival grew, the business model of control and efficiency was a logical fit for collegiate sport. University administrators, supported by some alumni and faculty, built athletic facilities, purchased equipment, and hired and handsomely paid coaches. In return, coaches developed rational means to guarantee victory such as training athletes’ bodies scientifically. In 1864 Yale’s crew coach William Wood implemented a systematic 4-week training program; during the 1870s, Harvard’s crew coach, Willaim Blaikie, implemented year-round training. Earlier in the century students paid to play sports by purchasing balls, equipment, and paying social membership dues. Later that century students-turned-paid athletes helped their team receive up to US$100 for a victory. Yale’s professional crew coach in the 1890s, Charles Courtney, received a 3-year contract worth up to US$1,500 (roughly US$35,000 in today’s dollars, accounting for inflation). In 1905, Harvard hired Bill Reid to coach football for the sum of US$7,000 (roughly US$165,000 in today’s dollars), or about double the salary of a professor. Reid, drawing on “rational business principles” instituted academic tutoring to keep athletes eligible, wrote a reflective coaching journal, organized workouts with weights and year-round training, categorized all of Harvard’s 4,000 students according to possible positions, and used photos to teach proper biomechanics (Smith, 1988).

Derived from English rugby, American football was purposefully rationalized, controlled, and modernized from the 1880s throughout the 1900s, largely due to the influence of former Yale head football coach Walter Camp (Oriard, 1993). Following the existing pattern of Ivy League crew coaches, Camp sought to rationalize football by engineering high-performing athletes and changing the rules. Whereas football players had often played multiple positions, the labor force was now divided and specialized to allow for maximum efficiency and greater effectiveness. Like his predecessors, Camp also demanded athletes subordinate themselves to the coach or “Czar” as he liked to put it (Smith, 1988). No stranger to domination, Camp deliberately changed the chaotic game of chance played by the English to give the American coach more power and control. Camp’s vision likened the coach to a general on the battlefield. One of the ensuing effects was a more violent “game” often resulting in serious injury and even death.

By the late 1890s and into the early 1900s several events provided the impetus for the growth and commercialization of football. Given the steady, increased need to market the university among growing competition and the explosion of revenues, alumni, most presidents and some faculty promoted football as a means to build manliness, character, and virility (Smith, 1988). Although some presidents and faculty decried the brutality of football, these voices lost out in favor of those on the board of trustees who enjoyed the spectacle often reserved for the social elite. The aims of profit and branding through spectacle have since guided collegiate football. Of a separate reality are any educational ideals such as civic engagement, an appreciation of the aesthetic body, kinesthetic intelligence challenged through competition, or the development of desirable behaviors or attitudes (i.e., self-esteem, identity, health, leisure, cooperation). Experience demonstrates that the tension between profit and education motives leads even the well-intentioned doomed for regret. The events at Penn State are an example of what happens when wire-thin tensions continue to be stretched.

So it was from the beginning intercollegiate that football had little, if any, vision for the educator-coach. The role of the professional (collegiate) coach has long been to win and generate profits (Smith, 1988). As long as the rules of the game clearly declared a winner and a loser after four quarters, a coach could claim he led his team to victory. With the help of the popular press, and eventually television, sportswriters propelled coaches such as Camp, Knute Rockne at Notre Dame, Amos Alonzo Stagg at Chicago, Paul “Bear” Bryant at Alabama, and of course, Joseph “JoePa” Paterno at Penn State to cultural icons (Oriard, 1993). Given these “exemplars,” the way of coaching had been normalized for others to easily mimic: “[Coaches] believe in the long-standing athletic tradition of ‘chewing out’ players, ‘kicking ass,’ and similar techniques” (Sperber, 2000).

The football coach’s training for this “profession” was usually only previous playing experience or a winning record. With such a clear indicator of success (win or loss) built into the intrinsic qualities of the contest, there appeared no reason for anybody—ever—to question the coach, let alone his training, education, or methods. It is telling that only recently have many of coaching’s taken-for-granted practices been critiqued by coaching scholars ¹ (Bush & Silk, 2010; Denison, Mills, & Jones, in press; Jones, Armour, & Potrac, 2002).

Today’s coaches willingly embrace the power to dominate. For example, to remain eligible athletes are told what courses to take and are provided extensive academic tutoring. Coaches further attempt to solidify their power by drawing on the “truth” of sports science to discipline their athletes. In this way, athletes rarely make a move without first considering whether their coach would approve. Still true today are the words uttered 100 years past by Casper Whitney, a prominent American sportswriter, who called the professional (collegiate) coach, “the most serious menace of college sport today” (Smith, 1988, p. 148).

The abuses at Penn State are examples of the most serious menace of intercollegiate sport today—the grotesque exercising of power to protect one’s self at the expense of others, all of which remained hidden in the shadows of collegiate sports’ murky underworld. Penn State graduate assistant coach, Mike McQueary, failed to take prudent action after allegedly witnessing a horrible abuse. Jerry Sandusky, Penn State defensive coordinator, allegedly abused the trust he had developed in countless young boys’ minds. These youngsters had lowered their guard, purportedly set free by Sandusky’s charms; ignoring the mantra they all had undoubtedly been raised to heed: stranger-danger. And the leader of this “educational” department, head coach Joseph Paterno, remained silent, an apparent stranger to all he knew. In the end, Paterno did what Foucault (1978) said was indicative of today’s Western man who needs to liberate and cleanse his soul—he confessed, “I wish I had done more” (Associated Press, 2011).

Let us also not forget the failure in responsibility by administrators, board of trustees, fans, and scholars who often knowingly turn a blind eye and a deaf ear to the long sordid everyday life of intercollegiate athletics. The abuses at Penn State are an example of what happens when we fail to critically analyze existing practices. Failure to act now in significant and meaningful ways guarantees one thing: It will not be a matter of if the next failure occurs; it will be a matter of when.

Numerous Problems, Few Solutions

The litany of problems dogging college sports has long been expressed in scholarly literature. While space limitations prevent fuller coverage, permit us to identify reoccurring issues (see Branch, 2011; Byers & Hammer, 1995; Knight Commission, 1999, 2001, 2010; Oriard, 1993; Shulman & Bowen, 2001; Smith, 1988; Thelin, 1996):

With the commercialization and professionalization of collegiate sports and other professional teams, these issues have also made their way to interscholastic and youth sports (see the award winning text by Farrey, 2009).

Over the past 150 years, reformers (e.g., The Drake Group, Knight Commission, League of Fans, NCAA, National College Players Association, and The National Consortium for Academics and Sports) of all kind (i.e., protectors of self-interests, reluctant educators, and radical activists) have tried in a variety of ways to restore, clarify, or create a balance between intercollegiate athletics and education. Others have simply cut athletics all together, as did the University of Chicago in 1939 to its then powerhouse football program (Thelin, 1996), and as did a recent Texas high school under budgetary constraints and academic accountability pressure (Sherman, 2012). Depending on one’s perspective, reform efforts may appear laudable, laughable, or radical. Reform is especially difficult as it runs counter to the master American narrative sustained by the media that sport is good and do not question the coach.

However, reform and policy have largely been reactionary. For example, in response to what was considered exceptional violence in sport, the uses and regulations of protective equipment were developed; in response to low academic standards, eligibility criteria (i.e., certain high school courses, minimum grade point averages, SAT/ACT scores), and progress to degree measures (i.e., Graduation Success Rate and Academic Progress Rate) were instituted; and in response to gender inequality, Title IX was passed in 1972. Still, negative unintended effects continue (i.e., injuries, tracking into “easy” or undesired majors, loss of female coaches, day-to-day abuses).

Arguably, today’s most well-known public issue facing collegiate sports is the economic exploitation of revenue generating athletes. Mounting criticism has likely been the driving force behind one proposal to pay football players a US$2,000 stipend for minimal living expenses. Significant if it passes, which appears unlikely as over 100 universities voted against the plan (purportedly due to lack of funding and questions of gender equity), this reform does not address other significant issues, and we would argue this modest stipend is a far cry from the economic upheaval that Marx envisioned (i.e., exploitation would still exist).

Coach Education

In the past 100 years sport participation rates have exploded. Over 57.3 million children under the age of 18 are estimated to participate in organized sport (National Association for Sport and Physical Education [NASPE], 2006). During this time numerous “professional” associations for nearly every sport have developed to help organize and support its members. Learning and training opportunities for coaches are now provided by several businesses and nonprofits such as American Alliance for Health, Physical Education, Recreation and Dance; American Sport Education Program; National Alliance for Youth Sports; National Federation of State High School Associations, the Positive Coaching Alliance, and The United States Olympic Committee. Notwithstanding this impressive growth, not even 10 universities in the United States offer an accredited undergraduate or graduate degree in sports coaching (National Council for Accreditation of Coaching Education, 2011).

Furthermore, the governance of interscholastic coaches and the requirements to coach remain relatively low and under state control (NASPE, 2006). Although nearly half of all states require coaches to have a teaching credential, most allow for “adjustments” (exemptions) if the coach has achieved other (lesser) training. Although a teaching credential is likely a well-intentioned requirement and arguably better than no training at all, it does not provide coaches with the necessary sport-contextualized knowledge. Some states do require coaches to complete minimal coursework on contents, such as cardiopulmonary resuscitation/first aid, sports rules training, or fundamentals of coaching. These requirements fail the laugh test for rigor and helping coaches to develop a deeper and more critical understanding of the “coaching act.” Outside of school-based sports (i.e., private ‘clubs’ or leagues), we know of no state or federal requirements to coach or oversight while coaching.

Clearly the education of coaches in the United States has never been a priority. This omission has occurred simultaneously as the education, requirements, and oversight of doctors, teachers, physical therapists, athletic trainers, and strength and conditioning coaches—all sports professionals like coaches—have dramatically increased. Determining why coach education has not been a public issue is a worthwhile scholarly activity, but more pressing is taking action to prepare better coaches. Indeed, the quality of the coach and the coach–athlete relationship has consistently emerged as the most important factors effecting athletes’ experiences in sport (NASPE, 2006).

The NCAA’s student-athletes (N = 430,301) comprise less than 1% of all youth-aged participants. We are looking in the wrong direction. Scandal-turned-spectacle distracts—the athlete–student–child’s everyday relationship with the coach is often filled with lies, degrades, neglect, abuse, coercion, or discipline (Denison, 2007; Gearity, 2009; Kirby, Greaves, & Hankivsky, 2000). College sport’s educational foundations, if they ever existed, have been wavering for some time, making athletic departments strange relations to their academic cousins. If we want to improve sports at all levels then we should improve the quality of coaches through more rigorous requirements and governance. We disagree with those who would reduce sport to mere play, competition, leisure, or bodily movements. We also disagree with those who would reduce coaching to the instruction of trivialities. Surely sport and coaching is socially and morally bankrupt when winning and profit are its highest and only aims? Guided by an ethic of care and the responsible use of power, however, sport could legitimately call itself a valuable educational experience.

Calling a “coach” a “teacher” is often used to indicate the coach’s ability to go beyond facilitating athletic skill acquisition toward developing an athlete’s entire self (Hyland, 1990). This coach, the coach Jones’ (2006) might have envisioned when he titled his edited book Coach as Educator, would help athletes reach both educational and performance aims. While all coaches attempt to improve the performance or practical knowledge of athletes, the educator-coach has another responsibility to take up educational aims. Developing a holistic or liberal view of the athlete’s self would include at least the normative educational aims of citizenship, vocation, and character or care. Determining these educational aims and the means used to achieve them is a difficult, enduring question; one we would not want, and could not even if we tried, to settle here. Suffice to say that no text in educational theory states profit and winning as its aims. ² The title and timing of Jones’ (2006) text, along with the current discourse related to “positive youth development” (Coakley, 2011) and “positive coaching” (Denison & Avner, 2011) may signify a growing critical thought pressing to (re)orient sport and coaches to educational ideals. As identified earlier by the work of a few sports coaching scholars, the small, but growing body of work related to a critical perspective of the educator-coach would continue to challenge normative aims, demand coaches model and prepare athletes to engage in democracy, and strive for inclusive and diverse ways of living. A vision for the educator-coach going forward is to help create new norms aligning sport with these broad educational foundations.

We revere the educator-coach precisely because he or she is the stranger, the exception to the norm of performance-based coaching. It is and should be deeply troubling that so many performance-based coaches walk the halls of our schools and universities giving the impression of an educator-coach. This is truly dangerous. Exemplary masqueraders are the coaches involved in the abuses at Penn State. In no way would an educator-coach or an education administrator condone the alleged abuse, its subsequent cover-up, and support a culture that facilitates such occurrences. The coaches at Penn State are an example of what happens when supposedly educator-coaches, not heroes, fail to live up to educational ideals. Now is the time to make the educator-coach the new norm.