A Partnership:

Summer League Swimming (SLS) has partnered with the Positive Coaching Alliance (PCA) because we share their vision of what youth sports should be. We believe the purpose of youth, high school, and collegiate sports is to develop Better Athletes, Better People.

Summer League Swimming is the introduction to continued youth, high school, and college swimming. We work at the grassroots level to develop leadership skills for swimming and life.

We know that sports, like swimming, are a great place to start this development because of the number of teachable moments they provide. We think all youth swimmers deserve to swim in an environment where they look forward to practices and meets and find joy in swimming that will last a lifetime.

Since its founding at Stanford University in 1998, PCA has helped to transform youth sports so that every young athlete can have a positive sports experience where they learn valuable life lessons.

To do this, PCA and SLS focuses on:

  1. Replacing “Win-At-All-Cost” coaching with the Double-Goal Coach® Model, which is based on lessons from sports psychology and the best practices of great coaches.

  2. Teaching youth sports organizations (YSOs) and schools how to create an organizational culture in which Honoring the Game is the norm.

  3. Sparking and fueling a national movement of Positive Coaching. There are four million coaches (like you!) working with youth athletes every year!

There are an estimated three to four million youth participating in summer and recreational leagues across the United States. This requires the support of an estimated 50,000 summer league swim coaches with high quality coaching and leadership skills.