September 2, 2014
My name is Danijela Tomic and I am originally from Bosnia
and Herzegovina but my citizenship is Croatian.
I came to the USA in 1995 to play volleyball at the University of
Arkansas at Little Rock where I earned my undergraduate degree and afterword
started my coaching career. I currently
serve as BGSU head volleyball coach.
Growing up in Bosnia and Herzegovina I was exposed to
different sports in PE classes but the only women’s club in my hometown was volleyball. I started playing volleyball when I was ten
years old and it was the main sport I played my whole life. I represented the selection of Bosnia and
Herzegovina as a high school freshman and sophomore and also made a Yugoslavian
junior national team with which I competed at several international
competitions.
Society to me is a large group of people who share a
distinctive culture and institutions and are governed by their own norms and
values. It is important to study the
relationship between sport and society because I believe sport is a microcosm
of society. The issues that we are faced
with in our society are the same issues that are many times magnified in sports
(i.e. racism, gender inequality, sexual discrimination, etc.).
When it comes to sport I am most passionate about using
sport (volleyball) as a platform to develop character and strong women
leaders. The experiences that come with
being a part of a team—winning, losing, conflict, challenging practices, etc.—provide
innumerable opportunities to develop character.
The character traits that produce an admirable human being—integrity,
commitment, perseverance, discipline, compassion—also make for better teams and
better players. Graduate studies in
Sport Administration will help me become a well-rounded coach who also better
understands a big picture of intercollegiate athletics. Also, it will give me knowledge and skills to
transition to an administrative role, if I choose to start mentoring coaches
instead of student-athletes.
A sporting event that had a great impact on me personally
was when my hometown women’s middle school team won the state title. It might not seem as a significant event, but
from that team the volleyball club was formed which was the only women’s club
in my hometown. That was also the first
women’s team that I saw play live and heard everyone talk about their
success. The day I saw them play on our
outdoor, asphalt volleyball court was the day when I decided as a nine-year old
girl that I wanted to be a volleyball player.
Until then I only saw men play soccer and basketball and neither one of
those sports was an option to play for me because I was a girl.
My expectation from taking this course is to acquire more
comprehensive knowledge about the impact that sport has on society and vice
versa. I am looking forward to class
discussions and hearing different perspectives on how we view sport and its
role in society. The main concern I have
is how I will manage my course work with my busy work schedule.
The part of your post that stood out to me most was the section that talked about your passion for the sport of volleyball, coaching and how you love to develop strong women leaders. I liked it because I can agree and relate to it greatly. I do not think there are enough women role models on the back hand side of sports, i.e. coaching administrative positions, etc. The reason why I would like to pursue coaching in the near future is because I too would like to work with young people to help develop them into leaders of the world through sport. I also agree that the main problems in our society are also the main problems in our sport, and what better way to fix those problems other than to instill character into younger people. Even if it is just a small group of people, it still makes a difference and I think that it is our duty as well-educated ethnic women to be great role models for the up and coming and coaching is a great way to do so.
ReplyDeleteBrittany Sinclair
Danijela,
ReplyDeleteI really enjoyed reading your introduction. I think you have one of the best definitions of society and I agree with the way you incorporated the issues we face in society are also found in sports. Being the GA at the Stroh Center I have watched a few of your practices, and will be at all of your home games. They are very entertaining to watch and I am excited for the season by the way. It is apparent that you are extremely passionate about your job and you keep the team motivated. All the girls seem to be a tight knit group and work together as one. It is like you formed them into their own society, because they share the volleyball culture, and I am sure they have their own values and goals that they want to accomplish as a whole. I also really liked your story about how you wanted to become a volleyball player. I couldn’t imagine playing volleyball on asphalt. I could relate to your post a lot because I am planning on going into coaching and I would love to build character, build future leaders, and also help players reach the next level.
-Mike Harrington
Danijela,
ReplyDeleteBrittany and Mike touched on this as well, but what really stuck out was when you said it was your passion to develop your volleyball players into strong leaders. You did not lead by discussing a winning record, or developing them into All-Star athletes, but instead wanted to further develop their leadership ability and concentrate on leadership characteristics. I've never had a coach for a school team who told my team as a whole that they wanted to develop us to become strong leaders. They typically only would have this conversation with the captains of the team, which was typically an initial conversation at the beginning of the season that was usually never discussed again.
I respect your mentality as a coach to develop your team as a whole to become strong leaders. From my personal experience that was unheard of while participating in a school team sport. When I participated in club soccer, the coaches had a similar mentality to yours. They demonstrated that they cared about us as individuals outside of sport instead of as athletes who were their ticket to a winning season/post-season.
Casey
Danijela,
ReplyDeleteThanks for sharing about your experiences in volleyball - your early exposure to the game, coming to the U.S. to play at the University of Arkansas, and your philosophy as Coach of the BGSU Women's Volleyball team. I really like what others posted in their comments - especially about the importance of developing strong (women) leaders. Annelies Knoppers, the former volleyball coach at Michigan State, has played a key role in my growth as a scholar. She did a lot of her research on coaching and was concerned with the decline in the number of women coaches. Some of her articles might be useful to you. I think you play an important role in mentoring.
I look forward to reading more of your future posts and thank you for all that you share in class.
Dr. Spencer