Are Community Programs Overshadowing School Sports Values?

From day one, Home Team Marketing has had a singular focus of supporting school based sports. We have been and continue to be approached by organizations that are not affiliated with education based athletics and as an organization we have decided not to pursue these opportunities. The primary reason we have not entered into these partnerships is because we have a core belief that high school athletics/extracurricular is a fundamentally critical component to the educational experience across the United States (Yes I know I am talking WAY above my head with that last comment! But please feel free to let me know again with a comment below.) For a number of different reasons, we believe more kids playing/participating in more events/activities is a good thing.

Thanks to our partners at the Michigan High School Athletic Association for giving me permission to distribute, in its entirety, an article that appeared in their most recent Benchmarks magazine, which is their quarterly publication. The article is entitled "Are Community Youth Programs Overshadowing Sports Values?"

Through observation we have heard that this topic/issue is almost universal across the country.  From where HTM stands and with respect to what we do, when we discuss partnership opportunities with State Associations, we always look for opportunities for the partnership to not only financially support the respective Association/Federation, but ultimately to help make the experience better for the participants, their families and fans. In the sense of true partnership,  we are looking for that magic equation where 2 + 2 = 5, a synergy where the end result is greater than the parts. This is where high school is different from our largely commercial and professional contemporaries (yes they are peers - in many respects we are better.)

The partnership platform (including media partnerships!) that we are all creating every day has the opportunity to achieve results maybe greater than any of us have thought before. Our partners have tremendous resources and if tapped properly, can help elevate the role and benefits or participation and Universal support of School based sports. 

I will be speaking with some of our Association partners in the next few weeks and I will post specific examples of where we think this synergy is starting to take place.

Again much thanks to the MHSAA for allowing us to post this article!