By Craig Morgan, thesundevils.com Writer
TEMPE, Ariz. -- About 30 Chinese men and women filed out of the Carson Student-Athlete Center's Hall of Fame on Sept. 20 as the Sun Devil football team was conducting post-practice interviews. As they passed an equally large group of local media and staff members, both sides eyed each other with curiosity.
A better, mutual understanding of two disparate cultures should arrive in the next three months.
A coaching education alliance between the Pac-12, Arizona State University, the University of Utah, the Federation University Sports China (FUSC), and the Chinese Scholarship Council began two weeks ago on the campuses of ASU and Utah. Over the next three months, ASU's track, swimming and basketball coaches will train 98 Chinese coaches. Specific topics for the program include coaching strategy, game preparation, film review, assistant coach development, and practice structure. The curriculum also includes sports psychology, strength training, nutrition, public relations and marketing, and tours of both on- and off-campus athletics facilities.
"President (Michael) Crow's emphasis on global engagement is one of the values that is shared by everyone in the university," said Julia Rosen, the managing director of Global Launch at ASU, which is managing the exchange. "Athletics has global activities but I think this is an opportunity to really raise athletics' profile in the global engagement arena."
The coaching education alliance is part of Pac-12 Global's five-year relationship to foster exchange between the United States and China through sports and education. The FUSC is China's solely authorized national organization for university sports and operates under the Ministry of Education. Since 2011, the Pac-12 and FUSC have worked together to stage exhibition and regular-season games featuring Pac-12 men's and women's basketball teams, coaching clinics and educational symposiums on collegiate sports, and there are plans for more sports such as volleyball to become involved.
This particular program was cited as one of the key achievements of the U.S.-China People-to-People Exchange program at the seventh annual U.S.-China Consultation on People-to-People Exchange, co-chaired by Secretary of State John Kerry and Chinese Vice Premier Liu Yandong.
"A lot of things we're doing are about building brand exposure and awareness over in China for our universities, Pac-12 commissioner Larry Scott said Saturday before the ASU-Cal football game at Sun Devil Stadium. "If sports is the front porch for our universities, because globalization is so important for our universities, sports have a role to play."
The exchange, which is funded by the Chinese Scholarship Council, includes classroom time in which coaches will detail their strategies, but the brunt of the work will be hands-on training, with Chinese coaches attending practices and competitions to get a first-hand feel for how elite collegiate coaches approach their jobs and their student-athletes.
"That's the best kind of education they can get," said swimming coach Bob Bowman, who ran similar but smaller exchanges in his time with the North Baltimore Aquatic Club. "They're going to see the good, the bad and the ugly. It's not just a showcase practice they come for and there is great value in that."
Senior associate athletics director Jean Boyd hopes to show off is the holistic student-athlete model that ASU trumpets.
"We know there are a lot of federations internationally that identify athletes early in their life and then get them on a track for high-level competition," Boyd said. "When their athletic lives are finished, their ability to transition into other parts of life is compromised.
"The American model of intercollegiate athletics really promotes this go-after-your-sport-at-the-very-highest-level model, but simultaneously improve yourself as a human being that can be a high achiever in life. We hope this program offers more of an introspective look at how you marry and balance those two. It doesn't have to be exclusively one or the other. There's a balance to be struck."
Track and field coach Greg Kraft agreed.
"We've had a total of 12 student-athletes compete in the London and Rio Olympic Games and only two of those 12 were on full scholarship," said Kraft, whose coaches will work the Chinese through coaching blocks on sprints, jumps, throws and distance running. "All the other ones paid part of their freight to come here because we are an equivalency sport."
In an equivalency sport, coaches can divide up portions of scholarships to provide funding opportunities to more student-athletes.
"I think they will be surprised that we have so many student-athletes just from the student population that come out and make our team."
Bowman sees other differences in the two approaches.
"We tend to base our system more on the arts side of coaching where we would be more intuitive and maybe more technique oriented," he said. "It will be a good chance for them to see where we are."
Xiaobin Wu, 35, who coaches swimming at the School of Physical Education of Chengdu, outlined several things he hopes to learn from the exchange.
-- "I would like to know Coach Bob Bowman's repertoire for teaching swimming techniques.
-- "I'm interested in learning how they schedule all-year training at ASU and see whether they can share their year-long training plan with us.
-- "The way American adolescent swimming athletes get cultivated and get trained.
-- "The ground-breaking methods for American swimming athletes.
-- "I wonder how American coaches study athletes' performance or improvement. Do they base it on their experiences or rely on any technological methods?
-- "Regarding monitoring training loads, I want to learn what kinds of methods ASU coaches use to measure training intensity especially."
The exchange won't be a one-way street, however. For example, men's basketball coach Bobby Hurley is gaining insight from the questions the Chinese coaches ask.
"Just to be able to go through the question-and-answer period with the coaches and see what things they are interested in learning about our game and style of play and how we train our athletes will be interesting," Hurley said. "But I think it could be very helpful for me as well to learn how they do things. I haven't been in this situation before and I really don't know what to expect, but I am expecting there are many things I will learn, too."
With collegiate coaches always looking for an advantage, cross country coach and track distance coach Louie Quintana saw another potential benefit to the exchange.
"We're going to establish some connections," he said, laughing. "Who knows? Maybe it will help in recruiting down the line."
TEMPE, Ariz. -- About 30 Chinese men and women filed out of the Carson Student-Athlete Center's Hall of Fame on Sept. 20 as the Sun Devil football team was conducting post-practice interviews. As they passed an equally large group of local media and staff members, both sides eyed each other with curiosity.
A better, mutual understanding of two disparate cultures should arrive in the next three months.
A coaching education alliance between the Pac-12, Arizona State University, the University of Utah, the Federation University Sports China (FUSC), and the Chinese Scholarship Council began two weeks ago on the campuses of ASU and Utah. Over the next three months, ASU's track, swimming and basketball coaches will train 98 Chinese coaches. Specific topics for the program include coaching strategy, game preparation, film review, assistant coach development, and practice structure. The curriculum also includes sports psychology, strength training, nutrition, public relations and marketing, and tours of both on- and off-campus athletics facilities.
"President (Michael) Crow's emphasis on global engagement is one of the values that is shared by everyone in the university," said Julia Rosen, the managing director of Global Launch at ASU, which is managing the exchange. "Athletics has global activities but I think this is an opportunity to really raise athletics' profile in the global engagement arena."
The coaching education alliance is part of Pac-12 Global's five-year relationship to foster exchange between the United States and China through sports and education. The FUSC is China's solely authorized national organization for university sports and operates under the Ministry of Education. Since 2011, the Pac-12 and FUSC have worked together to stage exhibition and regular-season games featuring Pac-12 men's and women's basketball teams, coaching clinics and educational symposiums on collegiate sports, and there are plans for more sports such as volleyball to become involved.
This particular program was cited as one of the key achievements of the U.S.-China People-to-People Exchange program at the seventh annual U.S.-China Consultation on People-to-People Exchange, co-chaired by Secretary of State John Kerry and Chinese Vice Premier Liu Yandong.
"A lot of things we're doing are about building brand exposure and awareness over in China for our universities, Pac-12 commissioner Larry Scott said Saturday before the ASU-Cal football game at Sun Devil Stadium. "If sports is the front porch for our universities, because globalization is so important for our universities, sports have a role to play."
The exchange, which is funded by the Chinese Scholarship Council, includes classroom time in which coaches will detail their strategies, but the brunt of the work will be hands-on training, with Chinese coaches attending practices and competitions to get a first-hand feel for how elite collegiate coaches approach their jobs and their student-athletes.
"That's the best kind of education they can get," said swimming coach Bob Bowman, who ran similar but smaller exchanges in his time with the North Baltimore Aquatic Club. "They're going to see the good, the bad and the ugly. It's not just a showcase practice they come for and there is great value in that."
Senior associate athletics director Jean Boyd hopes to show off is the holistic student-athlete model that ASU trumpets.
"We know there are a lot of federations internationally that identify athletes early in their life and then get them on a track for high-level competition," Boyd said. "When their athletic lives are finished, their ability to transition into other parts of life is compromised.
"The American model of intercollegiate athletics really promotes this go-after-your-sport-at-the-very-highest-level model, but simultaneously improve yourself as a human being that can be a high achiever in life. We hope this program offers more of an introspective look at how you marry and balance those two. It doesn't have to be exclusively one or the other. There's a balance to be struck."
Track and field coach Greg Kraft agreed.
"We've had a total of 12 student-athletes compete in the London and Rio Olympic Games and only two of those 12 were on full scholarship," said Kraft, whose coaches will work the Chinese through coaching blocks on sprints, jumps, throws and distance running. "All the other ones paid part of their freight to come here because we are an equivalency sport."
In an equivalency sport, coaches can divide up portions of scholarships to provide funding opportunities to more student-athletes.
"I think they will be surprised that we have so many student-athletes just from the student population that come out and make our team."
Bowman sees other differences in the two approaches.
"We tend to base our system more on the arts side of coaching where we would be more intuitive and maybe more technique oriented," he said. "It will be a good chance for them to see where we are."
Xiaobin Wu, 35, who coaches swimming at the School of Physical Education of Chengdu, outlined several things he hopes to learn from the exchange.
-- "I would like to know Coach Bob Bowman's repertoire for teaching swimming techniques.
-- "I'm interested in learning how they schedule all-year training at ASU and see whether they can share their year-long training plan with us.
-- "The way American adolescent swimming athletes get cultivated and get trained.
-- "The ground-breaking methods for American swimming athletes.
-- "I wonder how American coaches study athletes' performance or improvement. Do they base it on their experiences or rely on any technological methods?
-- "Regarding monitoring training loads, I want to learn what kinds of methods ASU coaches use to measure training intensity especially."
The exchange won't be a one-way street, however. For example, men's basketball coach Bobby Hurley is gaining insight from the questions the Chinese coaches ask.
"Just to be able to go through the question-and-answer period with the coaches and see what things they are interested in learning about our game and style of play and how we train our athletes will be interesting," Hurley said. "But I think it could be very helpful for me as well to learn how they do things. I haven't been in this situation before and I really don't know what to expect, but I am expecting there are many things I will learn, too."
With collegiate coaches always looking for an advantage, cross country coach and track distance coach Louie Quintana saw another potential benefit to the exchange.
"We're going to establish some connections," he said, laughing. "Who knows? Maybe it will help in recruiting down the line."