What are the chances that a grassroots coach will know what to teach a group of youth players who are at various stages of development?
The coach education system currently argues that it is much more likely a coach will know what their group needs once they complete formal coach education. How much more likely is unclear. And how much more likely it would be if they continue their coach education is also unclear.
The current system’s logic goes something like: “If we just give coaches enough education about periodization, motor learning, psychological development, tactical progression, etc., they’ll know what to do in any situation.” But even if formal education doubles or triples the chances a grassroots coach knows what to teach (and we have no real evidence it does), I still don’t think I like the odds.
What if we designed a system based on precision? Rather than hope that a coach will learn what they need to teach, we removed all hope and replaced it with design.
Rather than guess what people need, we learnt to gather and connect. We might not be good at that either. But the cost of being poor at that might just be less expensive than trying to develop the deep understanding of a complex set of circumstances that is youth sport development.
We can hope for luck or design for skill; it’s on us.