News and Opinion from Sisters, Oregon
News and Opinion from Sisters, Oregon
There are few things the Sisters community is more passionate about than Outlaws sports. When two successful coaches were let go this year - and all coaches were asked to reapply for their positions - it left some Outlaws fans in the community with a basic question: Why?
Sisters High School Principal Joe Hosang told The Nugget that there are considerations besides a winning record that go into assessing the success of a coach or a program.
"As nice as that is, that you're winning, I'm not sure that any school district would put in the evaluation the won-lost (record)," he said. "Really, it's about relationships, life skills ... Build the individual, connect with them, build the sportsmanship; build the relationships. The rest will happen."
Hosang declined to discuss the specifics of the dismissal of varsity volleyball coach Diane Bremer or girls varsity soccer coach Nik Goertzen, but he did note that solid relationships are a critical component of success in the high school sports arena.
"You have to be able to collaborate with the community; you have to engage the community, the parents; you have to create a good environment," he said.
Goertzen, who took the Lady Outlaws to the state championship game and was named 4A Coach of the Year, did not respond to a request for an interview for this story. Bremer, for her part, said, "I completely agree ... that it's not about the won-lost record."
She believes the program she built, which led to state championships and many playoff appearances, inculcated the very values Hosang expressed.
"There are 25 girls who have a state championship medal in their bedroom, and that means everything to them because they know what it took to get it," she said. "It took hard work, dedication, sacrifice. You can't just browbeat kids to go out and perform at that level. You've got to have relationships."
Bremer acknowledges that there were some conflicts and difficult relationships, but she argues that is not unusual in a popular, competitive program, where not everyone can make the team or play as much as they or their parents might think they should. And she believes that parental conflicts virtually always boil down to playing time, no matter how they present it to administrators.
"Their daughters are not getting the playing time they think they should get," Bremer said. "I don't play favorites. I put kids in positions by skill, ability, leadership qualities, their game-awareness."
Yet an environment of frequent conflict can create a difficult situation for everybody - players, coaches, administrators and parents.
Virtually everybody involved in Outlaws athletics agrees that a strong, preferably full-time athletic director (AD) is critical to ironing out problems and creating a consistent set of Outlaws values and standards.
With only a part-time AD doing mainly administrative work, Principal Hosang, as principal, was left to do the heavy lifting on athletics policy. Parents go to the principal with their issues, which can leave coaches feeling circumvented and puts the principal in the position of managing athletics when their focus should be on educational leadership.
That's a situation nobody likes.
"The AD would have done all that," Hosang acknowledged.
Bremer says that "not having an AD overseeing the department has created an environment where parents rule."
The matter has come up several times at the school board level - most recently in this month's board meeting, where Superintendent Jim Golden said that Outlaws sports will continue, despite budget strains.
"The real question that the board will have to decide is that we will be hiring an athletic director. Our discussion when we know more about our budget is the part-time (or full-time) position," he said.
In the meantime, Hosang has been attempting to create a more transparent and systematic approach to sports and coaching.
The school board has already agreed that all future head coaching jobs will be posted and candidates will be interviewed. All current coaches were asked to reapply for their position. New evaluation protocols and codes of conduct are being developed in an effort to define and make consistent Outlaws sports culture.
"What I'm hoping to get to is that we have more K-12 alignment," Hosang said. "I'm looking for the athletic director who knows how to do that and can create the environment for that to happen."
He also wants to provide more thorough training for coaches, especially those who are not also teachers in the district.
Parents and players have their input, too. Surveys evaluating the experience of Outlaws athletics are a new and apparently popular opportunity for parents and players to make their voices heard.
At last week's board meeting, parent Nancy Connolly said, "I wanted to thank the high school administration for taking the time to survey the parents about their concerns, good and bad, and ways to improve for the athletic program. I have had children in the high school athletics program for seven years, and this is the first time that anyone has asked what I or my husband felt. I applaud them."
Parent Merry Ann Moore expressed a similar sentiment: "Thank you very much to the Sisters School District, specifically to Joe Hosang, for putting in place a formal process so that every player and every parent can give feedback on coaching."
Though she may be coming at the matter from a different perspective, Bremer, too, thinks the community should weigh in.
"You need to let them know your thoughts," she said. "You need to let them know where you think athletics should go in this community."
As of last week, Goertzen was expected to coach Outlaws track. Anticipating the obvious questions, Hosang told The Nugget that Goertzen had been evaluated on soccer only and that track is a different sport with different coaching demands.
Jim Cornelius is editor in chief of The Nugget and author of “Warriors of the Wildlands: True Tales of the Frontier Partisans.” A history buff, he explores frontier history across three centuries and several continents on his podcast, The Frontier Partisans. For more information visit www.frontierpartisans.com.
Reader Comments(0)