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PCA Updates

City of Avon Lake Parks and Recreation Extends Partnership with Positive Coaching Alliance to Benefit Youth Athletes

02.04.2020

February 3, 2020 – The City of Avon Lake Parks and Recreation Department has extended its partnership with the Positive Coaching Alliance (PCA), a national non-profit movement developing “Better Athletes, Better People” by working to provide all youth and high school athletes a positive, character-building sports experience.

The partnership provides the City of Avon Lake Parks and Recreation constituents with access to PCA’s training, tools and resources for coaches, sports parents, youth athletes and administrators through live group workshops, online courses, books by PCA Founder Jim Thompson and additional online resources.

PCA has partnered with roughly 3,500 schools, districts, conferences, youth sports organizations and park-and-rec departments to create a Development ZoneTM culture, where the goal is using youth and high school sports to develop stronger social-emotional learning and leadership and reasoning developmental opportunities.

“When done right, sports are arguably the greatest vehicle to teach young people vital life lessons such as grit, resiliency, growth mindset, teamwork, goal setting, perseverance and many more.” said PCA-Cleveland Partnership and Development Manager, Ryan Virtue. “We look forward to continuing to work with Tim Pinchek and Olivia Taylor to provide more valuable sport/educational psychology and organizational behavior research and best practices to the coaches, parents and athletes in Avon Lake.”

“We are excited to team up with Positive Coaching Alliance,” said Tim Pinchek, Director of Recreation for the City of Avon Lake. “Partnering with PCA has provided the department with valuable tools to promote positive behavior and good sportsmanship to our participants, coaches and parents throughout our programs.  We are looking forward to the continued support from Positive Coaching Alliance and the positive environment our partnership helps create for our community.” 

For information about this partnership, please contact either Ryan Virtue (PCA-Cleveland) or Tim Pinchek (City of Avon Lake Parks and Recreation).



About Positive Coaching Alliance

Positive Coaching Alliance (PCA) is a national non-profit organization with the mission of creating a positive, character-building youth sports environment that results in BETTER ATHLETES, BETTER PEOPLE.

Youth sports currently involves 40M children, which presents a tremendous platform on which to develop youth character and life skills. Research has shown that in order for youth to accrue these benefits from sports, sports needs to be done in a way that creates a positive youth development culture. PCA ensures sports are ‘done right’ with programming that is research-based and designed to have an impact at three levels in a youth sports organization or school:

  • Youth experience improved life skills and character development.  They also perform better!
  • Coaches become more positive and increase their focus on using sports to teach life lessons.
  • Youth Sports Organizations & Schools see their cultures become more positive and everyone involved has more fun.

Since its founding in 1998, PCA has established 18 chapters nationwide, partnered with roughly 3,500 schools and youth sports organizations to deliver more than 20,000 live group workshops, reaching 19.2 million youth. PCA offers interactive online courses and has thousands of multimedia tips and tools for coaches, parents, athletes, and leaders available free of charge on PCADevZone.org. PCA also runs two annual awards programs: a scholarship program for high school student-athletes and a coach award program to recognize youth and high school coaches who strive to win and teach life lessons.

PCA gains support from a National Advisory Board of elite coaches, professional and Olympic athletes, organization leaders, and academics who share PCA’s mission including Cleveland Cavaliers assistant coach, Lindsay Gottlieb and others such as Joe Thomas, Dusty Baker, Carol Dweck, Herm Edwards, Julie Foudy, Phil Jackson, and Steve Kerr. PCA is proud to partner with more than 50 national governing bodies, youth serving organizations and professional leagues and teams including Boys & Girls Club of America, National Basketball Association, Major League Baseball, and US Lacrosse.

To learn more about Positive Coaching Alliance, contact: Ryan Virtue (ryan_virtue@positivecoach.org)