Lessons on Adolescent Development in Youth Sports with Jason Sacks

This episode features a conversation with Jason Sacks, President of Positive Coaching Alliance. For more than 25 years, PCA has worked to instill research and best practice in positive youth development into youth sports. There are more than 30 million young people participating in youth sports in the United States, although there are significant differences in access across communities, which is why a big part of PCA’s work is to advocate for greater equity in youth sports. PCA also offers training and resources to coaches, officials, parents, and youth to overcome the significant gaps in knowledge and capacity around positive youth development in youth sports. 

In part one of their conversation, Jason and Jason talk about the origins of PCA and its founder, Jim Thompson, who began the program out of Stanford University more than 25 years ago, the state of youth sports today for more than 30 million young people, including issues of equitable access, the pressures of winning cultures on youth and adults alike, the gap in training for coaches and the evidence-based workshops and resources PCA has developed and delivers to build knowledge and capacity of coaches in positive youth development.

In part two, they talk about the range of content PCA offers in its training and resources for a variety of audiences, including not just coaches but also officials, parents, and youth athletes themselves, the work PCA is doing to assess and provide solutions for local communities to provide greater access to positive youth sports experiences, articularly in under-resourced communities, the partnerships PCA engages in - from community organizations, to school districts, to large, national youth sports associations, the results PCA is seeing in changes in behavior among adults, the sense of confidence and self-worth among youth, and for communities, how many young people stick with positive youth sports programs over time. They also talk about connecting positive youth sports experiences to other important outcomes we care about for youth, such as engagement in school, attendance, and even academic performance. And they discuss PCA’s plan to scale to reach seven million coaches over the next five years through advocacy, technology, and more partnerships. 

Additional Readings and Resources

• Positive Coaching Alliance
  • Jim Thompson
  • Training & Workshops
  • Partnerships
  • Results & Impact
• Good Morning America segment: “Parenting playbook on how to handle bullying”
• Northwestern University Masters of Sports Administration Program

Chapters

• 0:00 Beginning
• 3:37 Part 1
• 22:51 Part 2