GoshenHigh School Athletics’

“Be the Best” Student Leadership Program

By Larry Kissinger, Director of Athletics, GoshenHigh School, CAA

“Student leadership” is a very popular topic in athletics. All education based athletic programs are constantly striving to make the athletic experience more positive for all participants. Several coaches at Goshen High School (GHS) were teaching leadership skills to their captains and/or seniors. When our football staff even began teaching these skills to all of their kids, it dawned on me what a wonderful opportunity our athletic department was missing to teach “leadership” skills.

The IHSAA offers a Student Leadership workshop every June. For several years, Goshen High School (GHS) would take a handful of students to this wonderful event. The students who attended were all very excited about the day and what they learned. However, the timing of the event made it difficult to implement ideas from this workshop and to keep the momentum going from the enthusiasm of that day. GHS finishes school each year by the end of May, so attendance at the IHSAA leadership workshop was never optimal. A two and a half month break then followed before our student athletic council, SAC**, reconvened in September to discuss ideas from that day.

For these reasons, SACand GHS head coaches decided to pursue a leadership program for GHS student-athletes, run by our own staff. During the 2008-2009 school year, Mr. Mike McMillen, former athletic director at FW Northrup HS was a guest at a SAC meeting. He led the students through different leadership activities. The response to this day was overwhelmingly positive, so at our head coaches’ meetings, we began to iron out the details of a GHS student leadership program.

Mr. Harvey Alston has frequently been the main presenter at the IHSAA student-leadership program. He shares a handbook entitled “Be the Best” with all the Athletic Directors in attendance. The GHS staff decided to use Mr. Alston’s handbook as an outline for our leadership program.

With feedback from head coaches and SAC, it was determined that the program should be offered to all student-athletes. The next challenge was to determine the time needed to introduce the material to student-athletes. Head coaches worked in groups of 3-4 to lesson plan for the 6 different topics from Mr. Alston’s handbook. Once it was determined how much time would be needed to effectively discuss/introduce each topic, the staff then determined the order the topics should be presented and the audience.

Topic / Year in School / Time allottment / Period at GHS / Staff needed
Rules to Live By / Freshmen / 45 min / 2nd session of SRT / 6-8
Bullying/Hazing and Integrity / Sophomore / 3 hours / 2nd period and an entire SRT period / 6-8
Confict & Resolution,
Excuses vs. Excellence,
Leadership/Sportsmanship / Juniors / 3 hours / 2nd period and an entire SRT period / 6 -8

GHS has a student resource time 2 days/week and a block schedule. The combination of these two made this program easy to sell to our principal, as sophomores and juniors would only miss one period of class each year. Any staff member interested in helping solicits volunteer subs from their department for their class periods and combines SRT’s with a neighbor. Staff members that have facilitated these sessions are head or assistant coaches at GHS. The table below details when each character principle of “Be the Best” is introduced. Seniors are invited to be involved to assist staff members in their small group discussions.

The sessions all involve: snacks and refreshments, video clips from “U Tube” or popular movies for the large group, discussion activities/worksheets in small groups of 10-15, and then a culminating activity such as a skit performed by the small group, a poster contest of what a good leader looks like, and a feedback survey. A brief planning meeting is held a few days before the workshop to share the lesson plan with each staff member who has volunteered to help facilitate.

GHS is currently in the implementation phase of this program and after this school year, will be offering all phases of the “Be the Best leadership program” to all interested student-athletes by the end of first semester of their junior year. Some of the consistent positives that have been shared through the implementation stage have been:

Students and staff interacting with those from other sports

Building pride in being a member of the GHS athletic department

Skits of “Conflict & Resolution” and “Integrity” have been amazing

Video clips have been extremely well received and pertinent

Leader posters were thought provoking and offered a tool that assisted the groups in exploring leadership characteristics in further detail.

The details of each lesson, results of the last feedback survey, the implementation phases, and the some video clips can be found on the GHS athletic website under the “Be the Best Leadership Program” tab. If you have any questions about the program that GHS is using to promote student leadership, please contact me at .

**SAC was created after our first trip to the IHSAA student leadership program.