Browsing by Subject "Coaching"

Now showing 1 - 8 of 8
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    Athletics Director’s Misses & Bull’s-eyes: Capitalizing on Targets of Opportunities to Hire Women Coaches of Women’s Teams at Select D-I Institutions
    (2019-06) Boucher, Courtney
    The number of women head coaches of women’s teams at the National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA) Division-I level has been well documented and remained stagnant at approximately 42% for years (Acosta & Carpenter, 2014; LaVoi, 2013; 2014; 2015; 2016; 2017). The role of the athletics director within the athletic department is crucial in understanding why this stagnation exists as they ultimately are responsible for making key hiring decisions (Sartore & Cunningham, 2007; Wilson, Gilbert, Gilbert, & Sailor, 2009). This descriptive longitudinal study aims to quantitatively examine the hiring behaviors of individual athletics directors and institutions at select NCAA Division-I schools. Institutions (n=86) and athletics directors (n=115) were graded based on how often they have (or have not) capitalized on hiring a woman to fill a vacant head coaching position for a women’s team. The ultimate goal of this study is to continue and extend the mission of the Women’s College Coaches Report Card (LaVoi, 2013; 2014; 2015; 2016; 2017; 2018) and to use the data to hold decision makers accountable and reverse the current stagnation in the percentage of women head coaches of women’s teams.
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    Coaches who care: the ethical professional identity development of moral exemplar collegiate coaches
    (2015-03) Hamilton, Maya G. B.
    Recent media attention has highlighted the commercialization, greed, corruption, abuse, and violence occurring in "big-time" NCAA intercollegiate athletics. While sport has great potential to be a context for moral education and development (e.g., Gibbons, Ebbeck & Weiss, 1995), participation in sport can also undermine athletes' moral judgment and behavior (e.g., Bredemeier & Shields, 1984). As mentors and educators, coaches can contribute to and make a difference in athlete moral development (e.g., Bolter & Weiss, 2012), especially at the collegiate level--an especially powerful time of growth in young adults' lives (Colby, 2008). Unfortunately, big-time intercollegiate athletics has been criticized for its "for-profit" business model, which puts pressure on coaches to place winning ahead of the holistic development of their athletes. While some coaches succumb to these pressures, engaging in unethical actions, others negotiate them and thrive as moral leaders. As central agents in the moral education of their athletes, coaches' own level of moral development and understanding of professionalism is important to consider.The purpose of the present study was to understand the ethical professional identity development of NCAA Division I collegiate head coaches who have made sustained commitments to moral values in their personal and professional lives. In-depth interviews based on moral exemplar (Colby & Damon, 1992) and moral identity development theories (Kegan, 1982, 1998) were conducted with 12 coaches nominated as "moral exemplars" by their peer coaches and athletic directors. Interviews elicited themes of moral exemplarity and professionalism including having an internalized moral compass; a deep responsibility, care, and respect for others; and a high standard of excellence; teaching; engaging in ongoing personal and professional growth; and being able to reconcile conflict in their personal and professional lives. Analyzing interviews using Kegan's (1982, 1998) framework of ethical identity development, 11 of 12 moral exemplar coaches scored above the average adult stage of ethical identity development, demonstrating strong unity of personal, moral, and professional values. Illuminating the mechanisms by which moral exemplar collegiate coaches develop and sustain an ethical professional identity can inform and improve coach education for current and future members of the profession.
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    Coaching High School Athletics: A Descriptive Case Study
    (2009) Michalicek, Kevin Paul; Riordan, Kim; Damme, Susan
    The coach of an athletic team plays an integral role in the lives of the student athletes with whom he or she is involved, not only as the leader of the team, but also in the development of the athletes as they progress from adolescence to adulthood. This dual role can lead to some very positive benefits for the coach and the athlete. However, there can be some very negative aspects of coaching when dealing with teenagers, parents and fans. In this descriptive case study, I personally interviewed several coaches from a Midwestern high school about their experiences as a coach, both the joys and the pains. The responses give clear insight into the world of the high school coach.
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    Developing physician leaders as coaches: A case study
    (2015-07) Kang, Ji-Yun
    Today's healthcare is faced with enormous challenges with the changes in healthcare policies that require delivering higher quality at a lower cost and at the same time with internal challenges of low tolerance for mistakes, complex nature of the industry, and multidisciplinary teams working together. As a consequence, the need to develop physician leaders to lead through these changes has become critical for the success of the organization. As part of leadership development efforts, an academic medical institution in the U.S. has identified coaching skills to be an important leadership skill to lead through the change. In order to create a coaching culture where leaders use coaching approach to develop staff through the change management, Leader as Coach training was given to group of high level physician and administrative leaders followed by matching the trained leaders as coaches with junior staff who are in the leadership pipeline. Case study was conducted to investigate the processes and challenges of developing physician leaders as coaches and the benefits of leaders engaging in coaching in the organization. Data collection was done through semi-structured interview of twelve physician leaders and documents of program evaluation as well as coachees' evaluation of the coaching engagements. Data analysis consisted of category (or theme) construction, sorting the data according to the categories constructed, and finally by making inferences about the relationships among the categories, developing a model that presents the visual representation of how the concepts or categories are related to one another. As a result, six themes were identified: understanding coaching and its philosophy, coaching as a leadership skill, coming together, coaching process and competencies, coaching challenges, and coaching outcomes. The study provided insights into the learning processes and challenges for physician leaders to be developed as coaches and indicated that increasing the internal coaching capabilities in health care organizations by developing physician leaders as coaches can have great impact in paving the way into many changes and challenges that are facing health care today. Coaching has been shown to be an effective way to operationalize approaches to leadership needed in time of uncertainly and complexity, and to enable continuous learning for the staff by constructing context-specific, tacit knowledge, leveraging the social capital and upholding the organizational values.
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    From Problem to Promise: An Examination of the Effects of Peer Group Coaching on the Wellbeing of Undergraduate Students
    (2015-05) Sommers, Jayne
    College student mental health has historically been framed as a "crisis"� in need of a solution. Currently, college counseling centers report an inability to meet the demands of students. This study invites a shift in thinking about college student mental health to a focus on student wellbeing. This focus is not meant to replace attention to severe mental health needs of students, but is instead intended to augment the work being done by student affairs staff. Given college students' increasing mental health needs, higher education professionals are obligated to explore additional means of supporting students. The practice of peer coaching has been demonstrated as beneficial to participants in spheres outside of higher education. This mixed methods study sought to examine the experiences of 30 undergraduate students enrolled in a semester-long peer group coaching program. Students who participated in peer group coaching (n = 30) showed significant increases in multiple dimensions of wellbeing as measured by the Ryff (1989) Scales of Psychological Wellbeing and the Social Provisions Scale (Cutrona & Russell, 1987), while a comparison group (n = 34) increased in only one dimension. Analysis of qualitative interview data provided description of the experience of peer group coaching in students' own words, and a third analysis involving both the quantitative and qualitative data provided support for and illumination of the quantitative changes. Overall, the results of this study support the creation of peer coaching groups as one means of addressing the needs of today's undergraduate students.
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    Professional development including performance feedback to support home visitors' use of caregiver coaching strategies during home visits
    (2014-11) Krick Oborn, Kellie M.
    Purpose: The purpose of the current study was first to evaluate the effects of a multicomponent professional development intervention that included two brief workshops plus a six week performance feedback package on the home visitors' use of specific caregiver coaching strategies and range routines utilized during home-based intervention. The second purpose was to examine the extent to which the home visitors' use of coaching practices related to changes in parent engagement, parental stress, parent self-efficacy, and child developmental progress. An additional secondary purpose was to examine the extent to which home visitors and caregivers reported the professional development and subsequent caregiver coaching to be: (1) acceptable, (2) feasible, and (3) effective in changing practice.Method: A multiple-baseline design across three home visitors and caregiver/child dyads was used to evaluate the effects of workshops plus a performance feedback package on home visitors' use of caregiver coaching strategies and range of routines. The functional relation between the intervention and the dependent variable of the home visitor's use of caregiver coaching strategies was analyzed based on visual inspection using guidelines established by Kratochwill, Hitchcook, Horner, Levin, Odom, Rindskopf, and Shadish, (2010). Results: Findings provide support for the use of individualized performance feedback targeting home visitors' use of caregiver coaching strategies as well as support for the use of operationally defined caregiver coaching strategies. All participating home visitors and primary caregivers reported the professional development and subsequent coaching to be acceptable, feasible, and effective. Conclusions: The results of this study add to emerging data on the use of performance feedback to support teacher implementation of caregiver coaching strategies in the context of early intervention home visits.
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    SPORTS information directors and the don't ask, don't tell narrative: applying gatekeeping theory to the creation and contents of Division I women's basketball online coaching biographies
    (2014-10) Calhoun, Austin Stair
    Researchers suggest that gay and lesbian coaches often respond with silence regarding their sexual orientation or family dynamic (Anderson, 2005; Griffin, 1998). Scholars speculate as to why this silence exists from two antipodal approaches: self-policing and institutionalized policing (Krane & Kauer, 2013; Norman, 2011). While we know that coaches respond with silence narratives (i.e., don't tell) when it comes to same-sex family narratives (Calhoun, LaVoi, & Johnson, 2011), it is unclear what dialogues (i.e., don't ask) occur between sports information directors (SIDs) and coaches with regard to including same-sex family narratives in online coaching biographies. Using Gatekeeping Theory (Shoemaker & Vos, 2009) as a guide, I examine the routines of BCS Division I women's basketball SIDs and investigate how the construction of online coaching biographies contributes to the absence of same-sex family narratives. The results from semi-structured interviews with SIDs (n = 14) provide insight on processes and dialogues between coaches and SIDs. Major findings were trifold: (1) SIDs presented similar communication routines when creating online coaching biographies, (2) each level of Gatekeeping Theory was reflected the content in online coaching biographies, and (3) SIDs explained the absence of same-sex narratives by placing the blame elsewhere and absolving themselves. This research has the potential to affect stakeholders and constituents in the sport and LBGT communities. Future research should address how SIDs can neutralize their routines and offer opportunities for inclusion of same-sex family narratives in online coaching biographies.
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    Teachers as Designers: The Iterative Process of Curriculum Design Focused on STEM Integration
    (2015-05) McFadden, Justin
    Curricular resources play an important role when educational reform efforts are introduced (Powell & Anderson, 2002). Taking Science to School (NRC, 2007) and more recently the Next Generation Science Standards [NGSS] (NGSS Lead States, 2013) have advocated for changes related to standards, curriculum, and teacher learning. Previous science standards (NRC, 1996) have been set aside as two transformational documents have taken the forefront in U.S. science education. The Framework for K-12 Science Education (NRC, 2012) and the succeeding NGSS are aimed at providing a new structural organization for science education that now includes engineering practices. The integration of science and engineering practices presents new opportunities and challenges for teachers as they must now design learning experiences that integrate science, mathematics, and engineering concepts. Teachers are not typically asked to be curriculum designers (Penuel, Roschelle, & Shechtman, 2007; Reiser et al., 2000) and when they are asked to be designers face unique challenges. There are limited studies (e.g. Boschman, McKenney, & Voogt, 2014) that directly investigate teachers during the curriculum design process and multiple calls to further explore teachers during the curriculum design process (Huizinga, 2014; Penuel & Gallagher, 2012; Voogt, et al., 2011). This study explores the actions and conversations of nine elementary science teachers during the curriculum design process while they design and develop a science, technology, engineering, and mathematics [STEM] integrated curricular unit. Teachers in the study worked in small teams and were paired with a coach during the design process. The study was framed around the participatory relationship that exists between teachers and curriculum (Remillard, 2005; Brown, 2002) and the view that curriculum design is a design problem that requires uniquely human interpersonal responses (Jonassen, 2000; 2011). This applied case study (Merriam, 2009) employed an inductive analysis and creative synthesis that followed the analysis strategies of constructed grounded theory (Charmaz, 2006; Glaser & Straus, 1967). Data collected from a 12-day professional development opportunity included audio-recorded curriculum design conversations of three unique teams (~3000 minutes), 12 individual interviews, daily participant reflections, and curriculum design artifacts. The study's major theoretical assertion is that teachers need encouragement to be innovative during the curriculum design process due in part to their tendency to design and develop curriculum resources similar to those they have used in the past. Teachers strongly considered their own classroom contexts during the design process and therefore primarily designed resources they could use in their own classroom. Secondly, curriculum design needs to be considered a design problem with no concrete solution that therefore warrants all participants be made aware of and prepared to discuss the complexities and propositions required of each designer (Remillard, 2005) during the curriculum design process.