Coaches Assist
NCAA Coaches Assist draws upon the fields of health promotion, health education and health coaching to provide skills and strategies coaches can use to guide student-athletes to appropriate campus or community resources and enable them to reach their full wellness potential.
The NCAA Sport Science Institute is committed to providing resources to help stakeholders at member institutions address the mental health concerns of student-athletes, with a goal of creating a culture where care seeking for mental health issues is as normative as care seeking for physical injuries. Explore the NCAA Mental Health page.
Resources For Coaches
Managing Student-Athlete Mental Health
This handbook provides information that you can use to effectively and quickly identify student-athletes who are at risk or are experiencing emotional symptoms.
Hazing Prevention
This handbook provides information and resources for NCAA administrators, coaches and student-athletes so that each campus can maintain a healthy and safe environment for all its student-athletes! NCAA legislation describes a shared responsibility between the NCAA national office and the NCAA member institutions to prevent hazing and protect the health and safety of all student-athletes.
Managing the Female Athlete Triad
The purpose of this manual is to provide coaches with strategies to identify, manage and prevent the Female Athlete Triad, which involves the interrelated problems of disordered eating (DE), amenorrhea (loss of menses) and osteoporosis (loss of bone mineral density).
Coaches Assist Training
Coaches are masters of communication and bringing out the best of student-athletes during competition. However, when it comes to talking to and supporting student-athletes about life issues — such as mental health, substance abuse, and relationship issues — there are simple but unique strategies coaches need in their playbook. Coaches Assist was developed by building upon the principles of health coaching, prevention science, and motivational interviewing.
Coaches Assist is an interactive workshop designed to assist coaches to become facilitators of student-athlete well-being. Coaches are introduced to a goal oriented style of interacting with and providing ongoing support to individuals in a non-judgmental approach that will allow student-athletes to consider taking steps toward better health. Coaches and educators will find this positive approach as a liberating experience as they become facilitators of student-athlete well-being and not problem fixers.
Coaches Assist was designed with the premise that coaches believe that:
- Every athlete matters
- Most athletes will respond to clear expectations
- Coaches must step up and intervene when needed
- A coach’s behavior matters
Enjoy the video below, “Coaches Matter,” that illustrates the important roles coaches play in the lives of student-athletes specific to alcohol and drug use.
