Coaching no More

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Home : 2001 : August : 21

Coaching no More
By Dawn

Well, I would have been interested, but I quit yesterday! I tried to coach middle school girls soccer last year. Overall it went pretty well, considering I had never played the game or coached before. My husband helped
ALOT (he's trained, licensed, and experienced), so I thought the girls benefited.
And yesterday I went to start setting up my room; principal calls me in to tell me a parent wrote to school board to complain about me. This is the same parent who smiles warmly in the halls and at school functions, even sits and chats with me at skating parties. She claimed in her letter, written this

past summer (9 months after the soccer season) that I used profanity (I didn't), that her daughter was forced to play a position she didn't want (no one was), and that my husband should not have been allowed to help.

So much for my sacrificing 4 hours every day after school. My own kids need me, my husband needs more rest, and we can definitely do without these "grateful" parents. What really galls me is that I was never given any inkling that she had concerns. She could have communicated with me, but instead she went over my boss's head.

So I quit. Nothing is worth having parents like that waiting in the wings to attack. I've got enough to handle with the regular classroom and those kids' parents.

Thanks for letting me vent. I probably could have vented this on a coach's board and gotten some support from all of you. Coaching, like teaching, could be so much better if we could eliminate the parents.

Good luck with establishing the board,
Dawn (newly retired coach)