Coach-officials meeting at beginning of year.

[Mike Simonds]

A few of us were planning to meet starting next month to develop a program for our annual meeting with coaches and officials.

Here we have spring football practice for two weeks and summer practice starts in August (high school).

Any specific or general ideas will be appreciated.

[kentref]

What have you done at your past annual meetings with coaches? Is this just your crew or is it all the crews in your association? Is this a mandatory meeting for coaches to attend?

[BktBallRef]

Our association holds a golf tournament with the coaches association, and we split the proceeds. Both organizations place their money in a contingency fund for things like members and their families who find themselves in difficult situations and in need. We've had an official who had cancer and one who was paralyzed in an auto accident. The coaches have had an AD who had cancer and two different coaches who had children with leukemia. In all those situations, both organizations made donations to ALL of those individuals.

Somethings are more important than the games.

[Mike Simonds]

I agree that social contact outside of football can be a great way to get to know each other and share ideas and insights.

Over here we have a mandatory meeting for coaches, officials, athletic directors and the league secretary (who is a paid full-time employee of the state department of education) at the beginning of the season.

Our goal is to standardize the format of the meeting and include visits to each team's summer training to discuss the rules and work a scrimmage as a crew.

The general annual meeting with all the coaches is attended by our entire association. In the past we just had our trainer get-up and talk about the new rules and points of emphasis. My idea is to make the presentation more visual and interactive; i.e., demonstrate what a legal block is and what an illegal block in the back is and what a clip is. Also, to clear-up the "urban legends" regarding the common differences between NF and NCAA/NFL rules. And to briefly explain the purposes of each of the officials and how coaches and players may legally interact with them.

Mainly, our goal is to reinforce the philosophy that high school football is an extension of the classroom and that officials and coaches have a joint responsibility to educate the student-athletes. In other words, officials are there to work with the coaches and players to become the best they can be.

[kentref]

Great format. Thanks for the info.