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The Publisher

ElevatingAthletes.net is published by Community Health Solutions, Inc. of Richmond, VA.

Community Health Solutions is dedicated to equipping people for excellence in community health improvement. We have trained or consulted with hundreds of clients on the topics of leadership, strategy, public policy, and community health programming.

We view positive youth sports programs as vital assets for promoting good health and positive youth development in every community. We created ElevatingAthletes.net to advance this vision.

The Editor

ElevatingAthletes.net is edited by Stephen Horan of Community Health Solutions. Steve has 20 years of experience in helping people create effective community health programs. He is currently faculty to several leadership institutes and lead staff on three large-scale community health improvement efforts. He is also a longtime coach, administrator, and researcher in youth sports, and the parent of three student-athletes. He holds a PhD in Education from the University of Virginia.

Our Philosophy

At ElevatingAthletes.net we believe that:

The first and most important mission of youth sports (interscholastic and club) is positive youth development. It is a good and noble thing to play to win; but not at the expense of the physical, moral, psychological, or spiritual development of young athletes.

All youth sports programs should promote positive youth development by teaching athletes how to excel by applying positive life skills. Stating the goal is not enough; every program should have a plan for coaching positive life skills through sports.

Coaches need and deserve continuing education on how to promote positive youth development and coach positive life skills. ElevatingAthletes.net was created to meet this need at no cost to coaches.

Youth sports most fully achieves its mission when participants give back to their community. This is the most valuable and lasting return on community investment in youth sports.

This philosophy is consistent with, and inspired by, the provisions of the Arizona Sports Summit Accord.