As soccer families across Ontario have settled into their new virtual routines over the last few weeks, an increasing number of Ontario Soccer member Clubs and Academies have stepped up in innovative ways to keep their stakeholders engaged.

Unsurprisingly, the focus has been on keeping the hundreds of thousands of soccer players across the Ontario Soccer community active and connected to their teams within their home Clubs and Academies. In addition, coaches across all parts of Ontario have been the beneficiaries of expanded online development offerings to hone their skills.

A number of our member organizations have not stopped there, however, also zooming in on parents at this challenging time. During traditional soccer times, parents are seemingly often reduced to simply paying for their kids’ sporting endeavours, while driving them tirelessly to countless practices and games.

Too often, however, parents are not embraced as a pivotal element of a player’s development journey. Now that COVID-19 restrictions have forced many activities to come to a temporary halt, this is a great opportunity to enhance the dialogue between soccer organizations and soccer parents, realizing that both very much play on the same team.

This week’s installment of the Grassroots Spotlight Series, therefore, focuses on the importance of and opportunities for parent engagement.  What are practical tips that any Club or Academy should embrace? How can organizations collaborate to ensure parents are invited to be part of the soccer development solution, rather than seeing them as difficult customers? To highlight some best practices in this regard, we are taking a closer look at the parent engagement efforts of LM Premier Academy.

As an Ontario Registered Academy (ORA) located in South Mississauga, LM Premier Academy’s focus is specifically on the development of young grassroots players from U8-U12, before it collaborates with a number of Ontario Player Development League (OPDL) license holders in the region to ensure players are directed to environments best suited to their continued development.

Academy Director Lee Merricks realized early on that parent engagement and education was paramount to give his players the right opportunities and experiences, while setting them up for developmental success. Needless to say, getting messages out to parents can be tricky, because they are always in a rush and everyone always wants an a la carte solution to their kids’ development.

In order to create a holistic environment building good people first, then good players, LM has focused on educating parents on development objectives, while avoiding to be unrealistic about development outcomes. That is why LM Premier Academy has instituted a “Learn from Home – Program” for its players, coaches and parents that was already well underway for a year before COVID-19 halted soccer back in mid-March.

Having laid this groundwork allowed LM Premier Academy to positively respond, as soon as Ontario Soccer originally announced the temporary suspension of all sanctioned soccer activities and offer deeper learning opportunities beyond merely keeping players and families busy via virtual training programs and video team meetings.

To foster stronger soccer families through the learning facilitated by ongoing at-home engagement, a total of 24 bi-weekly online sessions are offered annually (hint: the other 24 annual sessions are catering to LM Premier Academy’s coaches for their continued betterment).

Merricks sees these as a critical avenue for parents to learn, engage and regularly reflect on what kind of soccer environment they seek for their kids and to ensure the right fit of the program chosen. By the same token, they are deliberately scheduled far enough apart as to not overtax busy soccer households.

Not only enhances this approach the parents’ understanding and appreciation for program philosophy and delivery at LM Premier Academy. As a welcome side effect, Merricks has also found that giving transparent program information and rationale to parents straight from the source and regularly and honestly answering their questions has eliminated many unnecessary e-mails and turned the parents into ambassadors for the Academy.

With a myriad of technological solutions now available, Merricks and his team have found success in using tools like Google Classroom. Rather than just being a one-way download of information in a traditional coach-centric model, giving parents and players autonomy and accountability for their learning has been a game changer.

This more holistic approach establishing the Academy as a “primary school of soccer” has yielded better results compared to a more forced learning model.

In times of COVID-19, the Academy did not stop there. Leveraging its robust network of soccer contacts, they also offered a series of bespoke online sessions to families with thought provoking content.

Ranging from a webinar with Craig Harrington, the Utah Royals FC Women’s Head Coach (NWSL), and a follow-up session with his assistant coach Louis Lancaster, who worked extensively with young English star Jadon Sancho, to an insightful presentation delivered by Randy Waldrum, Head Coach of the University of Pittsburgh Women’s Soccer program, LM Premier does not only rely on its coaching staff to engage its parents.

Most impressively, Merricks also reached out to a number of his fellow technical leaders across the soccer community from organizations like Brams United, North Mississauga, Pickering FC and Oakville Soccer Club to ask them to share their online insights with the Academy’s stakeholders, which all of them were happy to do.

Proving that being nimble and adaptable during a crisis is key, Merricks also assembled a special offering for their younger programs, which were to kick off their summer program on the field this week. Instead, his team improvised and started their Grassroots Home e-Learning Program (that comes at no additional cost) for the affected families. 

This program sees them providing 3 online sessions per week, and will continue for as long as required until return to play becomes a reality for everyone again. Once back training outside, the online program will be modified and continue to become an integral part of the training that they will deliver to all of their members.

While for many soccer organizations across Ontario, parent engagement may be initially borne out of the short-term necessity presented by the current situation, the uplifting reality here is that by having regular, positive and quality engagement with parents, this at times difficult dialogue can be permanently changed for good.

It will help parents to assist their kids in finding a good soccer home, continuing to learn and improve, while staying engaged and challenged and realizing that a little struggle sometimes just comes with the soccer territory. Working as a team will ensure that everyone gets to have a better and more enduring soccer experience long after the current crisis has been overcome.