Coaches Make Great Mentors
Sports coaches often serve as some of the most impactful mentors in a young person’s life, offering guidance that extends far beyond the playing field. Many of these coaches naturally fall into the role of a mentor through their leadership position, and often pull from their own personal and real life experiences to mentor their team.
MENTOR aims to empower and equip youth sports coaches, recreation staff, and youth serving professionals with evidence-based practices in mentoring to support healthy, positive relationships with youth in their respective programs. We provide the training, resources, and an actionable framework for coaches and other reaction staff to apply positive youth development practices and skills as they support and guide young people.
While parents have a great deal of trust in coaches – when it comes to developing life skills, creating safe environments, and fostering a sense of belonging for their child, coaches overwhelmingly indicate they need more support to do so effectively. That’s why we are fostering a youth sport and recreation environment that is grounded in relationship-centered practices and caring adults who are building their mentoring mindset and skills to better support young people’s healthy development.
Community Need
While youth potential is equally distributed, access to opportunities that help unlock that potential–like safe spaces to play, learn and grow, as well as connections to quality mentors–are not.
The challenge is two-fold, with children not getting enough physical activity as well as the support, connection, and belonging that comes from mentorship and learning to play with others. Low-income neighborhoods are 4.5 times more likely to lack recreational facilities and 76% of children living in households that earn less than $25k are not playing sports. And in a time when many young people face social disconnection, coaches who prioritize mentorship are uniquely positioned to provide stability, encouragement, and life lessons that help youth succeed in all areas of life.
Resource Spotlight
- Mentoring At-Risk Youth Through the Power of Sports
- This research report highlights tips and important concepts for providing trauma-informed support for young people through sport.
- Get Moving! Using Sports-Based Programming to Bridge Mentoring Gaps Webinar
- This webinar explores critical concepts, strategies, and tips for program staff to consider when working with coaches and mentors in a sports-based context.
- Becoming a Better Mentor
- This resource shares real-world advice and evidence-based strategies for building the mentoring mindset, attitudes and skills that lay the foundation for a strong mentoring relationship. It also includes basic information on youth development and mentoring relationship cycles.
- Coaching Connection
- The Coaching Connection training offers coaches some of the best practices in building positive relationships from the mentoring field. It is built around the Search Institute’s developmental relationships framework, with a focus on offering the content in a coach-centric way. Below are the training slides, user guide and workbook which offer flexible ways to offer the training to your clients and community.
Partnerships & Campaigns
- Yes, Coach! Movement Announcement
- World Cup Host Committees, U.S. Soccer Foundation, and Stand Together Foundation launch a national campaign to train100,000 coaches as mentors, fostering a legacy of contribution.
