Communication, resilience and adversity. These are three of the many life skills student-athletes gain from being a part of a sports team. Dr. Steven Wachs observes that his students in his psychology and sports business classes often apply skills that they have learned from their sport into their day-to-day lives.
Wachs has worked at Campbell Hall for sixteen years, teaching primarily psychology, but has recently taken over the Sports Business class. Sports were significant in his household so he grew up playing them and eventually became a coach of Division One basketball team at Loyola Marymount University. He believes being a part of a sports team teaches the importance of hard work and camaraderie.
“Working to ensure that your best is better is a very valuable lesson that sports teaches athletes,” Wachs said. “Resilience is about failing and being able to come back after a failure and give the same level of effort the second time, [which] is a very important lesson to be learned. Sometimes you even have to sacrifice your personal glory for the benefit of the team and that’s another really important thing to learn.”
Like Wachs, history teacher and former football coach Marcus Everett believes that sports teaches children valuable life skills such as communication. Originally, he grew up playing basketball, football and track. Later in college, he received a full athletic scholarship for football at UCLA. He has experienced the benefits of being on a sports team from both a player and coaching perspective and has brought particular skills into the classroom as a teacher.
“Football has taught me so many life lessons,” Everett said. “The one that comes to mind is dealing with adversity. The mental toughness that football taught me has helped me overcome any challenge or any obstacle that I’ve run into in my life. As a coach, I have seen how football has impacted my players in the real world too. Every time I reconnect with any of my former players I see all the successful things that they’re doing in life and I know that the things that myself as well as coach Dennis Keyes instilled in them while they were here playing on our football team, they have applied that to their everyday life now that they’re in the real world.”
During the most recent tennis season, Grayson Weinstock ‘25 realized the importance of prioritizing her commitments and showing up for her team. This year, Weinstock faced a new challenge: playing without her sister as her doubles partner. Initially, she struggled to find motivation since she had never played with her new doubles partner, Samantha Haller ‘25, before. However, she soon realized the importance of prioritizing her commitments and being there for her team. Looking back, Weinstock has no regrets about the season. She feels deeply rewarded, knowing that all her hard work paid off. Her time on the tennis team reinforced the importance of dedication, whether to her classes, work, or sports commitments.
“When we had a match on Friday and all my friends were hanging out, I would always want to go hang out with them, and it would be hard committing to going to tennis,” Weinstock said. “I think those were times where I had to [remind myself that] I’m here for my team and even if I [can’t] go out it doesn’t matter because it all will pay off. It paid off for us this year. I gave up everything for this season, and when we won, it felt so good.”
In addition to the life lessons Weinstock absorbed from the tennis team, she stresses the impact and influence of her varsity tennis coach, Coach Steve Kuechel. During Weinstock’s first year on the tennis team in ninth grade, she never won any matches. She found herself crying after each match to her coach who never gave her any easy reassurances. However Coach Steve inspired her motivation and determination to push herself to her full potential.
“Instead of comforting me, Coach Steve would tell me ‘you gotta keep going,’” Weinstock said. “Four years later, looking back at it, that was the best thing he could have ever done for me. He taught me how to fight. He taught me how to never give up. I could thank him every day for it. The things that I’ve learned from Coach Steve and being a part of the tennis team I will take with me for the rest of my life.”
