Coach Education and Coach Development within a Contemporary Social Justice Society: Implications for Future Research and Potential Pitfalls

ABSTRACT

Literature discussing youth sport coaching indicates the importance of a holistic coaching approach, particularly related to the use of positive youth development (PYD) approaches promoting the development and transfer of life skills. However, in the shadow of recent sociopolitical movements such as Black Lives Matter and Me Too, raised awareness of mental health concerns and an ongoing global pandemic, there are calls for a reimagined perspective of PYD through a social justice worldview. The purpose of the current article is to posit how coach education programs and coach development systems can inclusively meet the diverse needs of coaches, youth athletes, and society alike. Specifically, two questions guided the development of this article: 1) Why should coach education and coach development integrate social justice life skills? and 2) How may social justice life skills be integrated into coach education and coach development? Ultimately, as researchers and coach developers, we must not only be advocates for social justice in youth sports, but critically engaged activists who progress youth – and societal – development forward.

KEYWORDS:

• Coaching
• youth sport
• positive youth development
• life skills
• critical consciousness

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).

Additional information

Funding

The work was supported by the Research Support Initiative (RSI) Grant provided by University of New Hampshire’s College of Health and Human Services.