Here is a great opportunity for people who might be interested in corresponding with young, aspiring athletes. Basically, Mrs. Maston is looking for athletes to mentor younger athletes in their training, inspiring them and giving basic training advice. Her team is called FAST, which stands for First Athabasca Seasonal Triathlon Team, (the town in Northern Alberta where she lives) and is composed of children and young adults from 8 years old to 17. If you are interested, please post below. I have copy-pasted the relevant portions of her email to me.
I started a volunteer, non-profit, triathlon team for the local children in our Northern Alberta town a year and a half ago. It is free to join and all costs associated with the multi-sport are covered by fundraising, donations (and my family). My husband and I strongly feel that no child should be left out of clubs, teams, activities, etc… based on deficits. We try to focus on asset-building and look at each athlete individually to help them achieve personal bests.
Our team consist of athletes from varying backgrounds and abilities. Some of the “labels” given to members of our team include: Autism Spectrum Disorder (my 11 year old son and 3 other athletes); Fetal Alcohol Spectrum Disorder (3 athletes); involved in the Foster Care, Child Protection, and Guardianship programs with social services (6-8 athletes); poverty (over three-quarters of the team); visual minority (about half the team); and learning disabilities (over three-quarters of the team).
All of our team members have numerous strengths as well, including: dedication, willingness to learn, acceptance of others, teamwork, hope for their futures, and vision. I try very hard to work with all the athletes so they can “be the best they can be,” and continue achieving new personal bests. I will be honest, I find it emotionally draining coaching the team at times. It is very hard to run a practice when half the athletes are having an “off” day. It is also a struggle because I feel that I am not dedicating enough time and energy to the athletes who do not require a lot of supervision, and are high functioning; resulting in them feeling less valued and neglecting their own personal needs for support. This particularly holds true for our oldest daughter, who is turning 13 years old this summer. She is an amazing athlete who quit the local swim club in support of her brother when he was denied admittance to the team based on his disabilities. I am very proud of her sense of social justice and commitment to a barrier free society; however, I do struggle with the fact that I am her only coach (and I am not qualified to coach to her level of performance). I am in the works of connecting her and one other athlete with some more experienced coaches. I am also trying to re-work the training schedule to spend more individual time with each athlete.
I am writing to you to see if any of your athletes would be interested in connecting with one or more of my athletes, and becoming a mentor to them. I realize this request holds a lot of responsibility and commitment on the part of your athletes; however, I believe the personal gain and growth that all the athletes can experience is well worth the initial effort and time.
I am very open to any suggestions you may have as to how to organize and operate this volunteer venture. Please let me know your thoughts, feelings, concerns, and suggestions regarding this possible program. The following is a list of a few of my initial thoughts:
All volunteer mentors must have a criminal record check done and kept on file.
Maybe you could talk with your athletes, and ask if any of them would be interested in this type of volunteer work. I am a registered social worker in both Alberta and New Brunswick, and would be happy to provide reference letters to all volunteers who fulfill a minimum commitment.
Given the background of many of my athletes, I feel it is very important that the mentors make a time commitment to this program. I would suggest somewhere between 6 months to a year.
I envision the operation of this program going something like this: your athletes indicate the age, sex, and any other specific qualities they would prefer in the athlete they will be mentoring. You will forward this information to me and I will make a match. Our athletes will then start communicating via the internet (I am happy with email, FaceBook, and other similar modes of electronic communication). They will be able to share inspirational stories of races and practices; disappointments in performances; possible ideas of how to improve or have a better race or practice; work on goal setting; and periodically review goals. Both athletes could talk about their fears and anxieties about races and hard practices, and a nutritional and healthy lifestyle / healthy choices component could be added as well. I find my athletes more open to listening to peers and other athletes about these subjects, rather than having me give them a talk periodically.
Your athletes will be the positive role models in my athletes lives that they long for and need to become ethical, fair playing athletes. Your athletes will model positive sportsmanship and encourage the same from my athletes. Hopefully, all athletes will benefit from this process with personal growth in the areas of fitness, leadership, academics, loyalty, determination, tenacity, as well as many other virtues and values that will naturally occur during this time.
All of my athletes have access to the internet, and those who require additional help with navigating the internet, typing, and reading will have parental, guardian, or coach assistance available to them.
Your athlete will not be responsible for any counseling of personal matters, and in fact, will be strongly discouraged from engaging in such discussions. If at any time your athletes feels one of my athletes is in trouble they should contact me and I will resolve the situation appropriately.
We should also have some form of confidentiality clause. I am not exactly sure what it should look like because I am not sure what this program will look like on your end. I am guessing both teams will want to talk amongst themselves about the topics that come up. I think it would be healthy and helpful for team members to brainstorm, discuss both the positive and negative experiences experienced by different athletes, and either send in congratulatory words to encourage or possible solutions to help the athlete improve their performance.
Presently, our team consists of: one 17 year old boy; one 15 year old girl; one 14 year old girl and one 14 year old boy (twins); one 13 year old girl; three 11 year old boys and one 11 year old girl; one 10 year old boy and one 10 year old girl; and one 8 year old boy. We also have some other athletes that drop in and train, but not on a regular basis. (Ages as of December 2010)