The OPDL Spotlight Series, presented by Toronto FC, highlights stories, teams, and initiatives from around the league. 

This week features comments from Adam Hoffman, Treasurer at Athlete Institute Football Club (AIFC) .

AIFC has been a part of the OPDL since 2015. Athlete Institute's history in elite level youth sport within Ontario proved how important it was for them to implement their soccer program into the OPDL because of its high standard for quality and the pathway it provides to players looking to prepare for the next level.

AIFC attracts and fosters talent through our highly skilled and experienced Technical Director, Steve Payne and his coaching staff. We combine qualified staff with the development of relationships with local clubs north of the GTA. We believe that because our first class staff keeps the players best interest top of mind, providing a world-class facility, and serving the community we are in, will lead to the greatest success.

At AIFC we focus on four areas of development, with the intention of building a world-class high-performance standards environment that will allow each player to reach their full potential as a player and person. Development of Club Affiliations, Player Development, Coach Development and Facility Development are the key areas we believe will give our players a pathway that follows the LTPD models set out by Ontario Soccer and the OPDL.

To create an environment that promotes the best performance of each OPDL stakeholder needs to start at the league leadership level and be passed through to the Technical Director down through the coaching staff, then onto the players. In order to achieve the best performance, everyone at each level has to believe they are working towards the same goal, and that's to provide players with the best experience to help them reach their full potential as soccer players and as people. That should be motivation enough to achieve best performance each and every day.

Adam Hoffman has been with the Athlete Institute for seven years. He joined the Mono, ON facility with the President, Jesse Tipping in 2010 to build an elite level training facility for Canadians so they didn't have to travel to the USA to attract NCAA scholarship opportunities. Hoffman is very excited about AIFC's soccer program because he believes it can help Canadian soccer players achieve their goals like what has been achieved in basketball for many years.