Thomas Haney Secondary PAC’s successful recruitment rally for sport team volunteers

During PAC sharing at the last DPAC meeting, Susan Unger, Thomas Haney’s DPAC representative, told us about a great idea THSS’s PAC implemented earlier this year.  We asked Susan to send us some details to post to the website.  (If your PAC would like to submit stories and information to share please email us at dpac_sd42@yahoo.ca)

Congratulations Thomas Haney parents and community!!!!

I am IN… are YOU?  was the theme for our first-ever Sports Rally on Sept. 15, 2009 at Thomas Haney Secondary.  This PAC-sponsored event was organized in response to discussions at our PAC meetings about lack of coaches for extra-curricular teams at the school.  School athletics department staff were invited to our PAC meeting in April to help brainstorm ideas re what parents could do to help with school sports.

One main idea that came out of these discussions was the need not only for additional community coaches, but also a need for Team Managers.  These managers would assist the teacher-coaches and community coaches with tasks such as preparing lists of contact information for players and parents; collecting uniform deposits, permission/medical forms; confirming game times and venues and similar duties.  This would free up more time for the coaches to focus on coaching the teams instead of being occupied with increasingly time-consuming administrative tasks.

So, how to help recruit parents?  After several meetings, the Sports Rally was organized.  Parents and students were invited to come out via the school website and newsletter articles.  Dinner was served by school culinary students, an emcee for the evening encouraged parents to get involved and kept things exciting by handing out prizes of PAC and team t-shirts.  The PAC executive was dressed in special blue PAC shirts, the coaches were in bright yellow shirts supplied by the PAC.  A power point slide presentation showed pictures of the previous year’s teams in action throughout the evening, and an additional projector showed a climbing volunteerometer as the numbers of volunteers went up.

By the end of the evening, 15 out of 27 team manager positions were filled, and an additional 2 coaches had volunteered.  A great result for a brand new idea!  If you would like more details (team manager duties handouts, format for the evening etc.), please contact our energetic PAC sports liaison at sportsvolunteers@thss.ca .

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