College recruiting is how college coaches and recruiters get top athletes for their colleges. Universities like the University of West Georgia with a growing sports department have been immensely impacted.
The NCAA has canceled both division one men and women basketball tournaments, but are taking proactive measures to lessen the coronavirus’s impact.
William Laurece Davis, ESPN Sports journalists, is very confident about college roof football returning this fall among Coronavirus fears.
3.COVID-19 causes high school juniors to lose benefits, students who would otherwise be doing in-person Recruiting during the fall.
Division one sports in-person recruiting suspended until August 31st.
Spring and summer months are crucial to college sports recruiting, but COVID-19 and NCAA regulations have immensely affected recruitment during the spring and summer months.
In a time of uncertainty, COVID-19 has caused many challenges for coaches recruiting for their colleges. College coaches and recruiters are taking initiatives and non-traditional means of recruiting future players for their college sports teams.
Coach Stanley Fite or more commonly known as Coach Skip by his players has been a head coach at the University of West Georgia for over 38 years. He started his coaching career at the University of West Georgia as an assistant coach and later took a head coach position at Brewton Parker. He was also the head coach at Augusta State University before returning to the University of West Georgia where he retired. As his career comes to an end, he shares his advice to coaches and recruits on how to be successful in the recruiting process while in a pandemic.
Although recently retired, Coach Stanley Fite is one of the many college baseball coaches that have witnessed the challenges that the coronavirus has brought to the game and the recruitment process. The coronavirus pandemic has changed the college baseball recruiting process for both coaches and recruits. Covid-19 halted college baseball recruitment and college baseball which began early this year, February 14, 2020.
From his time as a coach, Stanley Fite explains that recruiting is one of the most time-consuming yet one of the most important parts of being a coach. He said, “One of the key things to success was being able to recruit the right people.”
Over the years, recruiting techniques have transformed from telephone calls and mailed letters to social media, emails, and portals provided by the NCAA. Although many things have changed in the recruiting process, some things such as coaches going out to see and meet future players in person are still commonplace except during the COVID 19 pandemic.
As a result of the COVID 19 pandemic, the NCAA, National Collegiate Athletic Association, suspended all in-person recruiting for division 1 Sports until August 31, 2020. The suspension was made effective on June 25, 2020. This meant that coaches were not able to meet in person with recruits or perform any official or unofficial visits to the recruits’ games or practices. This suspension hurts high school seniors, high school juniors, and players transferring from other colleges. In the NCAA’s open letter to their student-athletes, they said, “To our fellow student-athletes and everyone else in this country, thank you for making an enormous sacrifice. Your sacrifice is not in vain; it protects millions of people around the world, including our family, friends, and loved ones.
The NCAA recommends that students use the time to research athletic programs and coaches. Coaches were also recommended to stay in contact with recruits via text messages, cell phone calls, and emails during the coronavirus pandemic
“Although COVID has inconvenienced many, including myself, the high school senior should not waste the time they have been given. They should be working out; baseball players need to be strong and fast.”
Coach Skip urges recruits and players to continue to work out even when there is no gym or weight room to do so because recruiting is still happening. Coaches have become creative in the ways that they are recruiting players. They have replaced in-person campus tours with virtual tours and visits to the recruits’ game with game tape analysis. The Portal is one of the more widely used ways to recruit players according to Coach Skip. He says that “The portal is an online portal, thing, that coaches use to look at the stats and other information about players and to meet with them too.”
Coach Skip knows that baseball is not the only sport that has been affected by the coronavirus pandemic and the NCAA suspension but hopes that all sports and recruitment will begin soon.
He says, “I’ve been coaching and playing this game for a very long time and this is just another bump in the road for us.”
The shortage of staff in police departments is sweeping the nation, especially in states like Georgia according to an article from the Marshall Project.
The shortage comes from members of the police force leaving, as well as not as many new cops are being hired – even with high recruitment efforts. This results in fewer patrols and less participation in vital community programs according to Chef Mansour.
Criminal justice graduate, Shellice Douglas believes the reason for the shortage is that the police are not being compensated enough for the risk that they take daily. “Low pay for a high-risk job and the demonizing portrayal of the police in the media are to blame,” she said.
Douglas also believes that millennials’ lack of interest in police work could also be a reason for the recruitment issues.
But there is a distinct difference when it comes to the cities and rural areas in Georgia. Media coverage of the police does not affect rural areas in the same it does in big cities.
“Fewer police officers put stress on the police force and require them to work more hours,” Said a GSU student, Xandria William. She added that overworked officers tend not to follow the procedures as much.
Although police brutality has been at the forefront of the news stories recently, Villa Rica Police Chief Michael Mansour says it does not affect his force. “Not in our small media market,” he said. “Our citizens support our department completely.”
One thing that both Mansour and Douglas agree on, is that the shortage of police officers affects the community negatively.
Even in larger communities, like Marietta, where there are more officers, there is still a shortage. Marietta officers Jose Ordonez, Phillip Scott, and Anderson Nudi agree the pay is one of the reasons recruiting officers is so difficult in addition to media’s painting of police and police brutality. “It could hinder young people from the job,” said Ordonez. Another consequence of the police shortage is longer response times and less visibility in different areas of the community.
The Marietta Police Department expects to raise entry-level pay at the beginning of next year.
“It is harder to keep them,” explained Mansour. He believes that because there is a growing job market with positions where men and women don’t have to risk their lives is also a reason for lowered interest in police work.
The city of Villa Rica is actively recruiting from the military and local universities to help bolster their police presence.
CNN is considered one of the leading news organizations in the world. Much of its programming is broadcasted from New York although its official headquarters is in Atlanta.
The CNN headquarters offers tours to the general public. Recently, I had the opportunity to go on a special, behind-the-scenes visit to the CNN headquarters. It was led by CNN Digital Editor Monte Plott on Thursday, October 18, 2018, at 12:45 p.m.
The tour starts with a security check and then dives right into the history of the building and the company. According to Plott, the venue was originally a failed, indoor amusement park, The World of Sid and Marty Krofft. Plott also mentioned that the escalator that runs through the center of the building stands as a remnant of the amusement park.
Later, Plott led our group to the different departments and networks that operate out of the building. He explained that the Atlanta headquarters of CNN houses four news networks: CNN En Espanol, HLN, CNN International, and CNN Domestic. Ironically, CNN Espanol does not broadcast in Spain, according to Plott.
The group was given several opportunities to talk to journalists and editors, as well as a fellow Georgia State University journalism major, Christina Maxouris, writing interning at CNN.
They were able to ask about stories that editors were reviewing and what writers were currently working on.
In the network’s formative years, the had a radio station that was unsuccessful according to Plott. The most intriguing part of the tour was the analytics board. It captures reports throughout the day and other trending reports from their competitors. The analytics board is massive and spans across an entire wall in the newsroom.
As the tour came to a close, Plott left the group with a few words of wisdom.
“As journalists, the only thing we have is our credibility. That means getting it right — getting everything right — from beginning to end.”
Kyle Pratt was born into a family of predominantly females without any male role models. Yet, he is making strides in the journey to becoming a man.
Pratt maintains focus on the important things in life while encouraging himself to adapt to different situations. He’s known to be an approachable, friendly, and caring individual.
He hasn’t had an easy life, often dealing with the struggles of poverty in his family. From an early age, Pratt knew that doing well in school was his only opportunity to create a better future for himself and his family. He learned to adapt to the hardballs that life would throw at him.
Pratt was a very smart child, although he was sickly and missed many days of school. But he easily became the teacher’s pet with good grades and his immaculate manners.
At age 14, Pratt and his twin sister moved to the United States during the middle of the school year. They left their island home Jamaica.
Moving was not easy for Pratt. He left behind his family, friends, community, and social groups for a world that was unknown to him during his adolescence. Like many of those who have gone through the same thing, he would have to use what he was thought to guide him in the new country.
He adapted the Southern American accent so he could be easily understood by his peers and made new friends while adjusting to a new culture. “One’s failure to adapt will lead to the downfall in life,” he said.
Moving from one education system to another, Pratt changed his strategy when it came to success in school. He was on the honor roll every year in high school.
Another thing he realized was that getting a job at 16 was a major part of the American lifestyle. His first job was working for Chick-fil-A and later Zaxby’s. He used his strength on the job – and became a manager at Zaxby’s when he was just 18 years old.
Today, Pratt sends his days between GSU and a suburban Zaxby’s where he is a manager. He had to change his mindset from being a crewmember to the manager of a store. He has more responsibilities and his interactions with other employees and customers have changed. Many of the younger employees look up to and respect him.
Even employees who were at the restaurant before he was hired to respect him as a manager. “His promotion was well deserved, and he is good at adjusting to his role as a manager. He makes many of the employees that he works with feel welcomed and appreciated for the work that they do,” said former employee, Heidi Atrian.
Pratt encourages fellow workers to adapt to the new responsibilities that they are tasked with. He knows that the future holds many new experiences and that adapting to those new things is not something he is worried about.
Kayla Pratt is a majoring in journalism with a concentration in public relations at Georgia State University. She will graduate in 2021 and hopes of working for a news organization such as CNN. She is hardworking and patient with four years of experience in the customer service field.
Born in Grand Cayman, she grew up in Jamaica and the United States. Pratt participated in communities service everywhere she has lived. She has volunteered in schools and non-academic projects.
Pratt has a twin brother and a big family, so sharing and being kind is a one of her basic instincts. She also learned to adapt quickly from experiences, such as moving from Jamaica at age 14 to the United States.
While in high school, she was a member of Wheeler Fights Cancer, the badminton team, the cricket team, National Honor Society, the Beta Club and the National Society of High School Scholars. She also volunteered at the Smyrna, Georgia Public Library and worked at Chick fil A. When she found extra time on her hands, she delivered meals to the needy.
Pratt graduated with a 4.0 GPA in high school, but more importantly found her passion for volunteer work and community service. In her future, she hopes to continue that and educate others about the importance of giving back.
She has also been the secretary and president of her high school’s service club, Wheeler Fights Cancer. She has also planned many events for the different clubs she has been involved in.
In her leisure time, Pratt enjoys watching movies based on books she has read. After graduating from GSU, she wants to develop a philanthropic effort in her community.
