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In addition to some new staff, BQ has given one of its existing staff a new role. Peter Pollock, the Junior Participation Manager has expanded his role to now encompass coaching as Club Coach Development Manager.
We caught up with Peter to find out exactly what his new role includes and what he will bring to this new role at Basketball Queensland.
What is your new role?
I am helping Tom Kyle in the club coach development space. Tom, with his IT background, will be spending more time in setting up and developing IT platforms for the basketball app and coach education. I will still be responsible for support and development of Aussie Hoops but more active in helping associations/clubs develop, support and recruit club coaches.
What are some of the responsibilities that your new role entails?
Tom and I are currently involved in a pilot initiative from the Australian Sports Commission, Gold Coast City Council and the Department of National Parks, Sport and Racing with the North Gold Coast Seahawks. It’s a “Coach Developer Program” (CDP) which aims to improve:
- the quality of coaching
- ongoing coach support
- coach retention
- parental understanding and support of coaching
- club structures
- support around coaches.
It essentially provides resources, guidelines and support for those leading coaches at club level to help develop and recruit coaches for club teams. We are also looking at ways of utilising Aussie Hoops at club level to help in the retention and recruitment of coaches. My role will be providing support to those coaches through the resources provided by the CDP program and drawing on my own experiences as well as helping Tom develop online learning experiences that coaches can access that is applicable to their level.
What are you looking forward to most, about your new role?
I am keen to get to the coal face. Our mum’s and dad’s and younger players are often our new coaches. In addition to having the club enthusiasts who are coaching more than one team. They are the root system of the development tree.
Every Olympian started somewhere and they are a product of their environment to a certain extent – the competition they played in, the players they played against and the coaches they had over their careers. So, in that respect, any coach that has put their hand up to help out a club team has had a part in the development of a Boomer or an Opal whether directly or indirectly. Without a strong root system the tree will topple.
I guess I see myself as the guy with the hose watering the tree.
How does your new role different from your existing role?
My new role is basically following the journey of the kids that have come out of Aussie Hoops and have joined a club. We have had massive growth in the Associations that have been active in participation programs, and so resources are needed to help service that growth. More coaches, referees and administrators are needed, not to mention facilities. I am seeing kids from 2013 Aussie Hoops programs that are now playing rep and their parents are coaching club teams or helping out in admin at club level.
We will be looking at how we can piggy back on the success of Aussie Hoops to help resource people at club level.
Will you continue with the responsibilities of your existing role?
I will still be here to offer support and encouragement to Clubs and Associations to develop their Aussie Hoops programs.
Who inspires you and why?
I have always had a lot of respect for those that have developed the game.
Burdekin Basketball (where I grew up) was the first Association to employ a coaching director in Queensland, Mark Bragg. Within two years, basketball became one of the biggest sports in our community. I used to coach D grade men, E grade women and A reserve women and play A grade men. There were at least 4 or 5 teams in each division.
That era produced some great players including a core group of girls that were part of the dynasty of Spartans women’s team during 80’s: Val Ah Wong, Linda Smith, Tara Vernon and Kim Saunders. These girls came from different clubs and had different coaches, but each their coaches had benefitted from Mark’s guidance. Mark was also the driver in the formation of Townsville’s first national sporting franchise the Townsville Suns. He was instrumental in my development as a player. He introduced me to Brian Kerle and allowed me the opportunity to tryout with the Bullets ‘85 team and then his old club St Kilda, where I was lucky enough to pick up a spot on their roster.
Later, Mark recruited me back to Townsville from the Saints to be part of the new franchise. On returning to the north I met an amazing guy, Charlie Doyle. Charlie was a retired serviceman from World War II who was doing, what was essentially Aussie Hoops and “So you Think You Can Play” games in the schools in the 1950/60’s. In 1989 he was 65 years old and was delivering more programs in schools on outdoor courts than even our best Aussie Hoops Associations could deliver in the last three years.
Not surprisingly, Mark Bragg was coached by Charlie Doyle with the Bouncers Basketball club. In any club there are those that give back and take on the challenges to move the game forward, those are the people I look up to.
How long have you been working at BQ?
- I began my career with Basketball Queensland when the Townsville Sun were formed: 1989-1993, working as Coach Director for North Queensland.
- In 1994, I moved back to SEQ to continue my role in high performance with the QAD and BQ.
- My latest stint in BQ started in 2013 with the relaunch of Aussie Hoops.
The time in between I started a business in early childhood physical education, “Smallsports” which I sold in 2010. In 2011 and 2012 I coordinated a participation program in the schools for South West Metro Basketball, which led me back to BQ and the 2013 Aussie Hoops relaunch.
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