Monday, June 29, 2009

Cooper's Shocking Results from P90X



Witness! Cooper went from a Lasagna stare down to a fine tuned machine in only 90 days!

Sunday, June 28, 2009

One Time at Band Camp

This weekend I spent two days in Miami, Ohio with our basketball squad not knowing what to expect. When you take a group of 14-17 year olds away from the their comfort zones of the high school life, it's like a box of chocolates as Gump would say. For you three clowns that normally read my blogs you all know what it is like to be a coach or part of a team that unites or crumbles because of the differentiating brain cells in the teenage head. Since the common theme of our blogs has been the good old days I have decided to drift off into another area that used to make my high school summers priceless. Summerball!

One thing that I have learned the last 3 years that I have been a head coach is the unbelievable items that I used to take for granted when I was a kid and especially in sports. From football camps in numerous cities in Ohio, to individual camps that you attended where your parents watched you for numerous hours working on a free throw, where did those funds come from and who was involved in getting you to that camp that you looked forward to so much.

This year I did a little different thing at my kids camp. I decided to make sure that our elementary kids gave thanks. I dedicated 20 minutes on the final day of our kids camp so they could sit down and make a "thank you" card to the person that allowed them to attend the event. You had to see the parents and grandparents faces when their little ones delivered those cards and said thanks.

In regards to my camp this weekend in Miami, Ohio I can honestly say that I have never had so much fun at a team camp in my life. As a player and a coach the only time that remotely came as close was watching the time when Brent got slugged in the arm over and over by one of our coaches while playing euchre:) I will say that our coaching staff and our parents didn't receive cards from our players instead we heard non-stop laughter and overheard stories from our players to our parents that seemed could not come fast enough out of their mouths. As I drove out of the parking lot I thought to myself. Did I ever take a second and tell my parents and coaches thanks? Nope I probably didnt, but I bet that when I returned with my stories and laughs no thanks was needed! But maybe a late one wouldn't hurt.

Thursday, June 4, 2009

The Real World


Mr.Brent Wise recently wrote a blog about the luxury of the teacher profession and our 2 1/2 months off away from the world of work. I would like to add to this with "The rest of the story."

From my experience most districts and most people will say that in this day in age teachers are overpaid or need to volunteer to take pay decreases in this economy because we are public servants. Yes,  that was an editorial in the newspaper the other day. My money is on the fact that the writer of that editorial was on his yacht cruising the panhandle of Florida. Go figure.

Here is something to chew on. During the high school day a teacher works with approximately 120-150 students. I will almost guarantee that in the so called "real world," as some of my relatives in business call it, that it is not far fetched that these professionals do not HAVE to talk to their clients everyday.(and reflect to yourself we are talking about teenagers) Then let's get real adventurous. Take those 150 clients and get emails from their parents. You are now dealing with 450 individuals. Tap on mandatory meetings for you to go to every 10 weeks where you need to explain how your progress with your client has been beneficial to them and them only. 

Let's chew some more. With this being said, add in your same subject teams, departments, administrators and any extra-curricular groups that you get hustled into because you need be part of the team. Now, if you have a supplemental contract,such as a coaching contract, you can tack on 30 more kids for bball, which leads to 60 more parents and the sticker on you shirt that better say "Satisfaction Guaranteed"

Now after reading this don't think that I do not like my career. I really wouldn't want to change my decision at all. But let's finish with these thoughts. 1) It's the United States these complainers could have picked to be teachers and they chose not to. 2) No matter how well your students do on tests you are not getting a commission check for that one 3) I think we should revise the so called summer vacation ideology to "Mental Health Days."

Maybe we should join the so called "Real World" after writing this article :)