Blog 20: Exit Interview

Content:

(1) What is your essential question and answers? What is your best answer and why?

EQ: What is the best way a girls' softball team can win CIF (California Interscholastic Federation)?

Answers 1: Character // Answer 2: Teamwork // Answer 3: Commitment // Best Answer: #2

I chose my second answer as my best answer because it was a common answer I saw being played out throughout my journey to answer my EQ. For my actual mentoring hours I mentored with Jennifer at LPHS and for my independent component 2 I coached middle school softball and one key thing that these two teams didn't have in common, besides the obvious, was the amount of teamwork that was shown throughout games and practices.


(2) What process did you take to arrive at this answer?

How I decided that my 2rd answer, teamwork, was my best answer was when my mentor Jason Rochwerg trusted me enough to let me coach a few games and practices. There were 5 out 14 members of the team that have had prior experience and were honestly the people who made most of the runs, catches, and hits but also the main people who would should up to practice whenever they felt like it. These players knew they were the top players because not only were they on a city league team while playing for school, or had already played for a league, they knew the rules like second nature while the rest of the players on the team were new to the concept of being on a team or the sport even. 

There was this kid, Bryan (8th grader), who was our pitcher and was very good at it too because he got an average of 3 out of 5 players out with a strike. Now, Bryan knew very well he was a good athlete and no one else on the team could pitch as well as him so he would constantly decide that he didn't need to go to practice because he simply "did not need it." My mentor Jason is very understanding when it comes to family issues or school work, but Bryan never gave a good excuse. He never lied either. He constantly verbalized that he didn't need practice because he already gets the practice with his other team and Jason asked him "what does your league team have that this team doesn't," and Bryan answered with, what I took as a personal insult, "an actual chance of winning." Now winning is important but when you have a team of people who are new to the sport or have never played a sport, you're more likely not going to win but improvement is definitely the outcome of it and Bryan didn't get that. He was more committed to a team he knew would win versus and team he knew wouldn't and as much as I hate his mentality on that, I was proven to do the same thing when my first independent component.

I joined Southlands Christian High School girl's basketball team and it was the same as the team I coached because only 5 girls knew the sport and were really good at it and I was one of them. I was really committed to the team, I went to all summer practices and even stayed late to get some more practice in because it was a while since I played but once the season started Julius Johnson, the coach, was teaching the sport from the beginning since we had players who have never touched a basketball. I love helping people as much as I possibly can so I did show up to all practices 4 out of 6 days a week for 2 months but after a while it got boring because there was so much I had to hold off on. I started to miss practice and caught myself not being as involved with the team as I was when I started and I forced myself back on the team and finished what I started and very glad I did.

Bryan and I had that in common because he was also very satisfied with the outcome of the team as well as became really good friends with people on the team.

(3) What problems did you face?  How did you resolve them?

Bryan was the main person to cause most problems with teamwork but definitely wasn't the only one. After every practice or game Jason liked to reflect and emphasize on what went well and what we as a team can do to improve. (sound familiar? Like, an iPoly method)

He really let me know that I had just as much authority over the team as he did because of how well the kids respected me and how great my ideas were. Now, I usually don't like to take over but when he said that I immediately said I was going to change the rules he had about practice. His rules were if you missed practice and don't have an valid excuse you wouldn't start but I wanted to change it to you wouldn't play. I understand it's such a big step to not let them play but they are in middle school and they have to learn now before they get into high school that when you are in a team you have to be respect everything the team as a whole has to offer or there will be consequences. A lot of the kids felt like this rule was fair and the only people who didn't were the kids who were constantly missing. We had to forfeited two games due to the fact that those 5 kids thought I wasn't being serious and we didn't have enough players to play because 5 of them were benched. It sucks yes, I get it and the kids hated me but they had to understand this was a team effort and not a 5 player team.

(4) What are the two most significant sources you used to answer your essential question and why?

My mentor Jason Rochwerg from Sierra Vista Middle School and Julius Johnson from Southlands Christian High School because they both helped me not only find answers for my EQ but also without knowingly provided perfect examples of the cause and effect of them. With Jason I learned more about commitment and with Julius I learned more about character but together they taught me how important we have to show teamwork is.

Be prepared with evidence and specific examples to support any response.  It is also significant to cite sources as you explain.