In my last post, I shared my belief that resilience is the most important lesson of sport. If I were asked to name the most important category of Lessons from the Driveway, I would choose Reinventing Youth Sports. 

It’s the reason I wrote my book.

It’s the topic I am most concerned about. 

Because if we don’t reinvent our youth sports system:

• More children will be excluded every year because of the cost.

• The number of people willing to coach and officiate will continue to decline.

• The number of youth sports injuries will continue to skyrocket.

• Children will continue to start and end their sports experience early, for a variety of reasons. Why do 70% of kids drop out of sports by age 11?

If we do not change course, only a small percentage of children will have the opportunity to play and gain the benefits of playing sports in the future.

We all need to ask ourselves: “What is the true purpose of youth sports?” and make thoughtful choices about how and when children participate.

Nothing I’ve said over the last two years is new. There are many people and organizations that provide resources and support positive youth sports experiences. I’ll be talking about them more in 2023. Because change is needed. For your child. For all children. You can start today.

photo by leah hetteberg on Unsplash