Welcome to IWLCA ASPIRE Cohort 3
Creating connection and supporting the development of women’s lacrosse coaches
We are delighted to welcome the third cohort of the IWLCA ASPIRE Assistant Women’s Coach Development Program, bringing together 26 collegiate women’s lacrosse coaches committed to investing in their development, strengthening their coaching identity and growing their impact.
Working in partnership with the IWLCA, e.t.c (Jullie Muller and Sarah McQuade) is once again supporting the design and delivery of ASPIRE – a development experience created specifically with the realities of the assistant coaching role in mind.
ASPIRE creates intentional space for coaches to step beyond the day-to-day demands of their programs and think more deeply about who they are as coaches, how they want to show up, and how they can continue to grow.
And, importantly, they do that alongside others navigating many of the same opportunities and challenges.
Meet IWLCA ASPIRE Cohort 3: 26 assistant coaches from across the collegiate game, learning and growing together through FORGE and Connected Confidence (CoCo).
Starting With Connection
Cohort 3 began in August with a Welcome & Connect webinar designed to do exactly that: create connection.
Before diving into content, we wanted the coaches to get to know one another, understand the journey ahead and begin shaping the learning community they will be part of over the coming months.
During that first session, the coaches also created identities for their two learning communities – FORGE and Connected Confidence (CoCo) – names that say something about what they want from the experience: opportunities to challenge themselves, build confidence, develop meaningful relationships and grow together.
That sense of community is an important part of ASPIRE. Development does not happen simply through the transfer of information. It happens through conversation, reflection, challenge, experimentation and the opportunity to make sense of learning alongside others.
Laying the Foundations
This week, both cohorts moved into the first phase of their learning journey with a webinar exploring Coaching Philosophy & Values.
The session invited coaches to think beyond what they coach and consider some deeper questions:
What do I believe about coaching?
What really matters to me?
How consistently do my behaviors reflect those beliefs and values?
And what does that mean for the experience I create for the athletes and colleagues around me?
Rather than treating a coaching philosophy as something that simply lives on a page, the emphasis was on making it visible through everyday coaching practice.
The webinar now leads into further individual learning and reflection, giving coaches the opportunity to continue developing and articulating their own coaching philosophy.
It is an important foundation for everything that follows.
More Than a Series of Webinars
ASPIRE is intentionally designed as a development journey rather than a collection of standalone learning events.
Across the program, coaches will experience a blend of facilitated webinars, online learning, self-assessment and reflection, peer learning, mentoring and opportunities to connect in person.
Each element has a role to play, but the real value comes from the connections between them: learning something, reflecting on what it means, testing it in practice, talking about it with others and deciding what to do differently as a result.
That is where development starts to become meaningful.
The Power of Mentoring
One element we are particularly excited about is the individual mentoring that sits within the ASPIRE experience.
Coaches need knowledge and tools, but development is rarely a straight line. Sometimes what makes the biggest difference is having dedicated space with someone who can listen, ask a different question, provide appropriate challenge and help turn reflection into action.
Later in the program, coaches will have that opportunity through individual mentoring conversations focused on their own development.
The intention is not to provide coaches with someone else's answers. It is to help them make better sense of their own experiences, recognize their strengths, identify opportunities for growth and take greater ownership of the coach they are becoming.
For us, that is an essential part of meaningful coach development.
Coming Together in Person
While much of the ASPIRE journey creates opportunities for coaches to learn and connect virtually, one of the experiences we are particularly looking forward to is bringing the cohort together in person at the IWLCA Convention in St. Petersburg this November.
There is something different about sharing physical space with the people you have been learning alongside. The Convention will provide an opportunity to strengthen relationships that have already begun online, share experiences and insights, and continue learning alongside peers within the wider IWLCA coaching community.
It is another important part of the ASPIRE philosophy: combining structured development with the relationships, conversations and shared experiences that help learning come to life.
Looking Ahead
There is plenty still to come for Cohort 3.
Over the coming months, the coaches will continue exploring themselves, their practice, their relationships and the environments they help create. They will learn independently and together, engage in individual mentoring conversations, connect in person at the IWLCA Convention, reflect, experiment and be challenged to translate insight into action.
We are only at the beginning.
But after the energy, openness and engagement of the Welcome & Connect session and our first Coaching Philosophy & Values webinars, we are incredibly excited about the journey ahead for FORGE and Connected Confidence (CoCo).
Because ultimately, ASPIRE isn't simply about helping coaches know more.
It is about helping them become more intentional about who they are, how they coach and the impact they want to have.
And we can't wait to see where this cohort takes that.
Comments