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Richard Skelly, Coach Development and Rugby Development Officer Support Manager at NZRU teamed up with Hugh Galvan, Senior Lecturer at the University of Canterbury, after identifying the need for coaches to gain a better understanding of how teenagers tick.
The main aims of the module are to:
- Better understand factors coaches need to consider when communicating with teenagers, and;
- Acknowledge that there are many, often complex considerations, when communicating with teenagers.
“There’s a significant drop in retaining teenagers in the sport as they leave secondary school,” says Richard Skelly. “So we looked into what we could do to change this, and identified the need to up-skill coaches on how to better understand the teenage psyche and work alongside them.”
“We have been running workshops around our provinces to introduce the new module, ‘Communicating with Teenagers’, and seeking feedback from the Rugby Development Officers (RDOs),” says Richard. “The module comes in the form of a PowerPoint presentation which can be altered to fit with the specific province’s demographic and it’s gone down really well.”
Because New Zealand’s regions are demographically diverse, the NZRU have asked RDOs to add their own local knowledge to the module.
“Teenagers in Westport are different to their peers in Auckland or Wellington, and we wanted to give our provinces the opportunity to make changes to the module to suit their needs,” says Richard.
The module is now ready to be rolled out nationally and Richard has already been contacted by other RDOs wanting to get their hands on a copy.
“We’re keen to see RDOs running the module in the New Year, when their annual compulsory Rugby Smart Programme is being delivered,” says Richard. “It’s a golden opportunity to get the module out there in front of the coaches at the same time.”
