The Quest to be a Savvy 'Sport Parent'
How we might exercise 'parent power' to best effect in service of young performers
Parenting a youth sports athlete is akin to a full-time job in itself, requiring no small sacrifice from the family and considerable investment of time, effort and money. Such a pivotal role naturally comes with a host of responsibilities. A parent may be expected to fulfil a variety of functions at different points. The sport parent effectively serves as an extension of the coaching staff, and during the course of the youth sports journey they may assume a number of different roles, from agent to high performance director.
Supporting a young performer is very much a collaborative effort – as the saying goes, it takes a village. Naturally, parents and coaches are key players, but the collective effort comprises a wider supporting cast, including peers, mentors and specialist support providers. The sport parent is the keystone of the supporting effort and often parents are forced to take the lead and assume responsibility for enlisting and coordinating the various support providers.
NAVIGATING THE YOUTH SPORTS INDUSTRY
Parents face mounting challenges in their quest to provide the best opportunities and ensure their kids experience all that youth sports have to offer. Youth sports are big business – it is estimated that the youth sports market is worth $15.3 billion in the United States alone. The 'youth sports industry' continues to see more and bigger commercial interests vying to exploit the desire of parents to support their kids' aspirations.
In these circumstances it becomes all the more important for parents to be discerning in their choices as a consumer. The quality of services rendered and the user experience vary widely, so parents must choose wisely. The search to find the right environment for their child is fraught with challenges and parents must grapple with the uncertainty that comes with trying to navigate unfamiliar territory. Much the same applies when seeking out the best coaching and enlisting other support providers.
Giving the sport parent a fighting chance means arming them with the knowledge to avoid being manipulated by marketing. Peeling back the curtain and lending greater understanding is important to redress the imbalance.
KNOWLEDGE TO EXERCISE ‘PARENT POWER’
Sport has the potential to provide myriad benefits, but we should acknowledge that the youth sport experience is not always universally positive. There are clear indications of where we are currently falling short – one incontrovertible sign is the precipitous drop in participation that we see across all youth sports once kids reach their early teenage years. Those who govern sport certainly have a responsibility to confront and remedy the situation, but it is parents and the young performers themselves who are faced with negotiating these problems and they cannot afford to wait for administrators to act. Any real change is likely to come down to individual efforts ‘on the ground’, hopefully assisted by forward-thinking coaches and practitioners (and frankly to date there is little evidence that sports organisations and administrators are in fact capable of resolving these issues).
It is parents who ultimately have the power to help create the conditions for their own child to experience all that youth sport has to offer. The more informed sport parents become, the better equipped they will be to use their influence. The immediate task of navigating a youth sports landscape that is fraught with challenges requires being clear in our aims and understanding what it is we are dealing with. At the very least we can help to avoid the common pitfalls and mitigate the factors that lead kids to disengage and drop out.
We need to enable more savvy sport parents so that they can exercise their power as consumers. One of the most effective ways that parents can wield this power is by making wise choices in where they spend their money. With better understanding we can harness market forces in a way that acts in the young athlete’s favour. Knowledge is power when it comes to applying the consumer pressure that will be necessary to drive change within the youth sports marketplace.
This content was first published in the book Sports Parenting: Navigating the Youth Sports Journey to Help Kids Thrive released in May 2022.