By Wayne Goldsmith
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Sport has a teenage drop out problem.
Every sport.
Every nation.
Kids get to their mid-teens and the vast majority decide it’s time to drop out of competitive sport and focus on other things.
I’ve heard a lot of people try to explain this problem away….
“It’s the parents’ fault. They’re all too busy to take kids to sport practice”.
“It’s the Internet! It’s those awful online games like Fortnite and Minecraft that are ruining kids’ lives”.
“It’s society! Kids are soft these days. They don’t want to train and work hard to achieve success!”.
To quote Luke Skywalker…”Everything you just said is wrong”.
Close your eyes.
Try to remember when you were a teenager.
What did YOU want from the experience of sport?
* To have fun;
* To learn new stuff;
* To have friends in your team or squad or club;
* To have a coach you respected and liked - and who you felt respected and liked you;
* To feel like you were improving;
* To feel like you belonged - like the club or the team was “your safe and happy place”.
Kids have not changed that much.
They still want - what you wanted when you were their age.
So the question is - are you delivering the experience of sport that todays teenagers are looking for?
If not - then that’s a pretty good place to start if you want to decrease your sport’s teenage drop out rate.
Wayne Goldsmith
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