United Soccer Coaching's Director of Coaching (DoC) Course returned to Kansas City at the beginning of February 2024 after a considerable break.
I was thrilled to join the dream team of Ian Barker, Andrew Donnery and Tess Suprenant as the faculty for this weekend to shine a spotlight on quality coaching.
The DoC is designed to address the issues confronting the Director/Leader of an American soccer club/organization. It examines the technical, conceptual, leadership and administrative skills of future and current Directors of Coaching for youth soccer clubs for the purpose of developing the American soccer player. This is accomplished through a curriculum rich in application and theory, focusing on a range of topics including:
Organizational structure
The “business” of Soccer
Methods of coaching
Leadership
Development of coaches and players
Fiscal, legal and moral responsibility
Sports Science
Given e.t.c's unique positioning in the coach learning and development space we were able to offer insights into key concepts and tools that DoCs could leverage to enable high quality coach learning and enhance coach effectiveness.
The first workshop challenged DoCs to identify if they had a vision for coaching and if/ how well this was shared with key stakeholders across their organization. The second workshop focused on the concept and application of coach learning. The final workshop explored the adult learning principles, encouraging DoCs to consider how to use these as a reference point to design, deliver and evaluate coach learning.
The areas explored in the three workshops offered just a small taster of the learning which is housed in the Coach Developer Diploma and Mentoring Soccer Coaches Diploma offered by United Soccer Coaches.
