The City of North Olmsted Parks & Recreation Department has created a new partnership with the Positive Coaching Alliance (PCA), a national non-profit movement developing “Better Athletes, Better People” by working to provide all youth and high school athletes a positive, character-building sports experience.
The partnership provides the city’s coaches with access to PCA’s training, tools and resources for coaches, sports parents, youth athletes and administrators through live group workshops, online courses, books by PCA Founder Jim Thompson and additional online resources.
PCA has partnered with roughly 3,500 schools, districts, conferences, youth sports organizations and park-and-rec departments to create a Development Zone® culture, where the goal is using youth and high school sports to develop stronger social-emotional learning and leadership and reasoning developmental opportunities.
“We are excited to partner with the City of North Olmsted and thankful they are taking a proactive approach to elevate the youth sports culture in their community,” Said PCA-Cleveland Partnership and Development Manager, Ryan Virtue. “Many coaches and youth sports organizational leaders have never received any sort of formal training outside of skills and drills so we look forward to injecting some of our sport and educational psychology and organizational behavior research and best practices.”
“We are extremely excited to collaborate with the Positive Coaching Alliance as the North Olmsted Parks and Recreation Department programs mission mirrors that of the PCA,” said Betsy Drenski, Commissioner of North Olmsted Parks & Recreation. “We look forward to sharing the ideas and resources of the PCA with the coaches of our youth sports programs.”
For information about this partnership, please contact either Ryan Virtue (PCA-Cleveland) or Betsy Drenski (City of North Olmsted Parks & Recreation).
Ryan Virtue, Positive Coaching Alliance
Tel: 440-465-6552
E-Mail: ryan_virtue@positivecoach.org
Betsy Drenski, City of North Olmsted
Tel: (440) 716-4216
E-Mail: drenskib@north-olmsted.com
About Positive Coaching Alliance
Positive Coaching Alliance (PCA) is a national non-profit organization with the mission of creating a positive, character-building youth sports environment that results in BETTER ATHLETES, BETTER PEOPLE.
Youth sports currently involves 40M children, which presents a tremendous platform on which to develop youth character and life skills. Research has shown that in order for youth to accrue these benefits from sports, sports needs to be done in a way that creates a positive youth development culture. PCA ensures sports are ‘done right’ with programming that is research-based and designed to have an impact at three levels in a youth sports organization or school:
Since its founding in 1998, PCA has established 18 chapters nationwide, partnered with roughly 3,500 schools and youth sports organizations to deliver more than 20,000 live group workshops, reaching 19.2 million youth. PCA offers interactive online courses and has thousands of multimedia tips and tools for coaches, parents, athletes, and leaders available free of charge on PCADevZone.org. PCA also runs two annual awards programs: a scholarship program for high school student-athletes and a coach award program to recognize youth and high school coaches who strive to win and teach life lessons.
PCA gains support from a National Advisory Board of elite coaches, professional and Olympic athletes, organization leaders, and academics who share PCA’s mission including Cleveland Cavaliers assistant coach, Lindsay Gottlieb and others such as Joe Thomas, Dusty Baker, Carol Dweck, Herm Edwards, Julie Foudy, Phil Jackson, and Steve Kerr. PCA is proud to partner with more than 50 national governing bodies, youth serving organizations and professional leagues and teams including Boys & Girls Club of America, National Basketball Association, Major League Baseball, and US Lacrosse.
About The City of North Olmsted Parks & Recreation Department
North Olmsted Parks & Recreation encourages and supports an active lifestyle. Adult and little leagues, ice skating, water aerobics or a stroll in the park – their programs and facilities welcome everyone into the fold and onto the field. Residents and nonresidents of all ages and interests are invited to take advantage of what the City of North Olmsted has to offer.
For more information about the City of North Olmsted Parks & Recreation, please visit https://www.north-olmsted.com/parks-recreation-department/.
