It seems that they put so much into their athletes that they forget about the other people who mean the most to them.
Is this the sacifice they pay?
It seems that they put so much into their athletes that they forget about the other people who mean the most to them.
Is this the sacifice they pay?
Yes, as with every vocation there are pros and cons.
The college coaching system can grind you down, especially depending on the situation. When you consider most coaches coach not only both genders at the same time (and no other college sport does this), but effectively is coaching through six championship seasons a year (xc, indoor and outdoor track for men and women)and basically year around if you want a good team.
On top of that recruiting is a non-stop cycle with people graduating and with all of the technology available and their public accessibility it gets tougher and tougher for a college coach to leave their job behind at the end of the day.
Most college coaches started out as athletes with a passion for the sport and then one step led to another as they paid their dues while young and got into coaching. However, your passion has to be able to overcome long hours, low wages, the recruiting wars, dealing with admin, budgets, being away for over 1/2 of the weekends a year from family, etc. and of course the non-stop pressure to put good competive teams together.
I can say the job has changed a lot even in the past 15-20 years. Some for the good and some not so good.
You trade one thing for another in life. I will say from experience you are either raising someone else's kids or your own, but usually not both at the same time if you're a college coach. Something to think about...
Would you agree it would be very challenging for a woman looking to be a college coach while simultaneously trying to raise a family?
Same as with all coaching. Raising other peoples kids, worrying more about their goals and aspirations than they do, little pay, long hours. If the job is done right, it never ends. Hard for a family to get the attention they deserve.
I guess I look at it a little differently. It used to be that most men worked 10 hours a day and half a day Saturday. After breaking ass all day so that the kids were taken care of he didn't do much with them after he got home .. a couple of beers and the newspaper and some down time. Then, some of the weekend was work as well. Lots of blue collar folks still work the same schedule, with Saturday's part of the plan. It's society that has changed the outlook of what "should be", and meanwhile parents with more free time hover around their kids and never let them explore, never let them learn independence.
A hard working coach should be appreciated by his family for how he attacks his career, and learn from that. A hard working coach should make sure that he doesn't become a track and field geek, and put the sport to rest when his work is done. Too many dysfunctional distance runners out there ... let it go, let it go.
To: Some Coach,
You must be living in a different world then most of the current coaches out there. Do you not recruit? Do you never return e-mails, do you just coach a handful of athletes or never travel to meets? A 9-5 M-F life would be cake compared to the hours most college coaches put in. And you can't even quantify the emotional stress that comes with it at times; eating disorders, parents, AD's, injuries, the NCAA, paperwork galore and trying to have a competitive program at the same time. You only have so much energy to give and A LOT of college coaches family's get the shaft. Some never see their kids compete on the weekends. It would be fine if it was just a season like basketball, football, soccer, etc., but with college xc/track the grind never ends. That's the problem. You can ignore it and have a mediocre program or if you want to be competitive then you better be on top of your game. This isn't 1980.
Well over 70% of college coaches get divorced within 15 years in the coaching ranks...well above the average.
coaching bluez wrote:It seems that they put so much into their athletes that they forget about the other people who mean the most to them.
You mean that they put so much into the people who mean the most to them (their athletes) that they forget about the other people who don't mean as much to them. The coaches who care about their families find a way to keep them a priority.
To No Way Jose':
I WISH I was a college coach ... I coach high school. I actually have a job from 7-2:30 everyday where I can't take care of all the coaching minutia and then I take care of all of the things that go along with high school coaching, including all of the things you have listed. AND, after practice ends, all the teaching paperwork kicks in as well. Obviously recruiting is substantially different, but recruiting kids out of the hallway is still a part of it .. and we get to deal with your recruiting piece on the other end of the process.
I work 65 hours a week 10 months out of the year, and a summer job for six more weeks to supplement my income.
My point is ... stop the bitching. You're coaching. Try mining coal, or owning a business. Most people wish they could be so lucky .....
SomeCoach wrote:
To No Way Jose':
I WISH I was a college coach ...
Uh, no you don't. Please don't comment on something you know nothing about.
How can you commment on what I know and what I don't know? I have several friends in college coaching, and we compare schedules often ... it's pretty much a trade off. And, why can't I WISH I was a college coach? ... I may regret that wish ... but I can wish.
When I was 22 I didn't care about money, having a family wasn't even on the radar and I didn't care where I lived. I just knew I enjoyed the sport a lot and wanted to get into coaching so I followed the road wherever it took me while paying my dues. Life at 22 is very different then 32 or 42, etc.
However, the demands of the job don't lessen with time and you can never let up. Priorities in your life chage and with that so do responsibilities. You have look at things honestly and see that you really do make huge trade-offs to pursue the vocation. You can make a lot more money, have more time at home and less stress doing a lot of other jobs. But I guess everyone has something different that makes them tick so each to their own.
There are a lot of rewards too though like seeing a person's life really develop over time or watching someone achieve their goals. Both are intangible.
But the stat someone listed about the divorce rate is sadly true. Most college coaches are already like foster parents to an extent because you spend more time with student-athletes throughout the year then just about anyone else.
That's just the facts...
It's not just coaching. Almost any career that is a "vocation" rather than a "job" can be consuming. When I was in grad school, I asked a favorite professor how I could get to where he was (highly respected worldwide as an authority in his field, author of 9 books, including two regarded as essential). He answered, "I'm not a very good husband and father. I work every day of the year except Thanksgiving day and Christmas day." I know folks who work 70+ hours per week practicing medicine or law, and others who practically live in airports doing commission sales. Even teaching high school and coaching can become a detriment to a balanced life. I guess one big difference is that some of those other jobs come with either high pay, high prestige, or both. Unless you are one of just a handful of big-name D1 studs, the "payoff" for the sacrifices you make in college coaching tends to be a little less obvious.
SomeCoach,
Uh...I coached HS too, not even a comparison. And yes I taught college classes too.
As mentioned above, don't comment on something you aren't doing. I don't tell Ryan Hall how to train for marathons.
And I can PROMISE you make more as a public HS teacher/coach then the majority of college xc/track coaches.
College coaching is not glamorous and the NCAA Championships is not the Holy Grail.
I never spoke about money ... yes, there is a financial difference unless you find it to the very highest level of college track and field. I do not make what a Vin L. makes.
With the exception of recruiting (which I agree is a significant portion of a college coaches job) there is no difference between what you do as a college coach and what you do as a high school coach ... in fact, college coaches very often have the luxery of coaching athletes with a background and also some degree of talent. I coach three seasons of 50-50-100 athletes in each; most college coaches do not have those types of numbers to deal with, write workouts for, etc. We have grades to check, as well as eligibility, etc. Is our paperwork as extensive as the NCAA? Don't know ... but you don't know what our paperwork is like either. I do know that I have six periods a day that last for 50 minutes each where I have to interact with kids and have no time to complete any type of paperwork. That is 5 hours of time that a college coach (who doesn't have teaching duties, some do) has to take care of paperwork type responsibilities. I know that I arrive at school at 6:45, and I'm often still working at 9:00 p.m. I don't know of any of my college coaching friends who do the same ...
But mostly, my original point was this ....
1. Folks come on here and bitch about college coaching. OK, quit ... do something else.
2. The thread was started by presenting the idea that college coaches have compromised family lives. Earth to the world ... so do most other people with jobs.
3. Again, feel free to mine coal or start your own business, and get back to me about that.
I get to school at 4:45 and leave at midnight. Everyday. Forever.
I'd have a cot in my office superman .....
Here's a thought:
All of these people who compromise their family lives for their work actually enjoy their work more than their family.
You can have a demanding job and still have a good family life. You have to know when to make the right sacrifices. If it comes down to losing my family or losing my job, I am going to lose my job. It's a lot easier to find a new job than it is to find a new family that you love, and life isn't about working all the time anyway.
Some Coach,
No offense intended, but you are delusional. I have coached at both levels, and there is simply no comparison. HS teaching and coaching was a cush job. No regrets and wouldn't go back, but just saying.
Furthermore, just like coaching in HS, there are all degrees of college jobs. Coaching in a prominent DI level program, where performance counts, recruiting is never ending (and doesn't take place in the hallways between class) and your athletes are on their own 21 hours a day is no picnic.
I too wished I was a college coach years ago, and I was lucky enough to catch a break. It can be a rough transition, and the world is very small and tight at the top. Watch what you wish for.
SomeOtherCoach wrote:
Some Coach,
No offense intended, but you are delusional. I have coached at both levels, and there is simply no comparison. HS teaching and coaching was a cush job. No regrets and wouldn't go back, but just saying.
Furthermore, just like coaching in HS, there are all degrees of college jobs. Coaching in a prominent DI level program, where performance counts, recruiting is never ending (and doesn't take place in the hallways between class) and your athletes are on their own 21 hours a day is no picnic.
I too wished I was a college coach years ago, and I was lucky enough to catch a break. It can be a rough transition, and the world is very small and tight at the top. Watch what you wish for.
I would say it depends on what subject you are teaching in high school. If you are teaching PE, you aren't doing much paper work after school. Not much to plan, not much to great. If you teach English, you are constantly grading papers. I am a high school English teacher and coach, and I know several college coaches. If you put yourself into it, they are both demanding jobs. The big difference is that if you slack off as a coach, your team sucks, you get fired. If you slack off as a teacher, nothing really happens to you.