There's a question that crosses every parent's mind at some point during their child's youth sports experience. It usually surfaces the first time their kid rides to a game in a coach's car. Or the first time practice runs late and their child is alone with an adult. Or the first time they drop their eight-year-old off at a facility and realize they don't actually know the person running the session.
The question is simple: Is my child safe here?
Not "is the coaching good." Not "is the field maintained." Safe. As in, does this program have systems in place to protect my child from harm? Does someone know where my kid is at all times? Are there boundaries around how adults interact with minors? And if something were to happen, would anyone know what to do?
Most parents never ask this question out loud. Not because they don't care. Because asking it feels awkward. It feels like an accusation. Like they're implying that the friendly volunteer coach who's been with the program for six years might be dangerous. So they swallow the question, hope for the best, and carry a low-grade anxiety that never fully goes away.
The programs that earn the deepest trust from families don't wait for parents to ask. They answer the question proactively. Before the season starts. Before anyone feels uncomfortable. Before anything happens that requires the question to be asked urgently.
And the answer isn't "don't worry, we'd never let anything happen." The answer is "here's our system."
Why "We'd Never Let That Happen" Isn't Reassuring
Most youth sports programs are run by good people with good intentions. Directors care about kids. Coaches volunteer because they love the sport and want to give back. The vast majority of adults in youth sports are exactly who they appear to be.
But safeguarding isn't about good intentions. It's about systems that work regardless of intentions. Because the uncomfortable truth is that the small percentage of adults who do harm children in organized settings are often the ones who appear most trustworthy, most dedicated, and most beloved by the community. They don't look like threats. They look like your best volunteer.
This isn't meant to create paranoia. It's meant to explain why "we trust our coaches" isn't a safeguarding plan. Trust is wonderful. Systems are better. And the programs that have both earn a level of parent confidence that programs relying on trust alone never will.
The U.S. Center for SafeSport developed the Minor Athlete Abuse Prevention Policies (MAAPP) framework specifically to address this. The framework isn't built around catching bad actors. It's built around creating environments where harm is structurally difficult to occur. When a program adopts these principles, they're not saying "we think our coaches might be dangerous." They're saying "we've built an environment where every child is protected by design."
That distinction matters. And it's the distinction your families need to hear.
The Three Pillars Families Need To Know About
You don't need to hand parents a 30-page policy document. You need to communicate three things clearly and simply: how your program handles boundaries, how you manage one-on-one interactions, and what happens if someone has a concern.
The first pillar is boundaries. This means your program has defined standards for how adults interact with athletes. Communication between coaches and minors happens through observable channels. A coach texts a player through a group chat or a team management app where parents have visibility, not through private direct messages. Physical contact is limited to what's appropriate for instruction and celebration, like a high-five or a hand on the shoulder during a drill correction. Social interactions between coaches and individual athletes outside of program activities follow clear guidelines.
These boundaries exist not because coaches can't be trusted with a private text or a ride home from practice. They exist because clear standards remove ambiguity. When everyone knows the rules, nobody has to wonder whether a specific interaction was appropriate. The coach is protected from false accusations. The athlete is protected from inappropriate contact. The parent is protected from anxiety. Everyone benefits.
The second pillar is one-on-one interaction policies. The MAAPP framework is built around a core principle: minimize situations where one adult is alone with one minor. This doesn't mean a coach can never speak to a player individually. It means those interactions should be observable and interruptible.
In practice, this looks like individual conversations happening within sight of other adults or athletes. Meetings taking place in open areas rather than closed offices. Rides to and from practice or games being avoided unless another adult or athlete is present. Locker rooms and changing areas having clear supervision policies. Training sessions involving a single athlete being conducted where others can see.
These aren't burdensome restrictions. They're environmental design choices that make everyone safer without changing how your program operates in any meaningful way. A coach who gives a player individual feedback in the corner of the field instead of in a closed equipment room is doing the exact same coaching. The only difference is visibility.
The third pillar is reporting pathways. If a parent, athlete, coach, or bystander sees something concerning, they need to know exactly what to do. Who do they tell? How do they tell them? What happens next? Will they be taken seriously? Will there be retaliation?
Most programs have no clear answer to these questions. And when the pathway is unclear, concerns go unreported. Not because people don't care. Because they don't know where to go, and the cost of reporting feels higher than the cost of staying silent.
A clear reporting pathway includes at minimum two points of contact, so that if the concern involves one of them, there's an alternative. It includes explicit language that reports will be taken seriously and that reporters will be protected from retaliation. And it includes information about external reporting options, including local authorities and the U.S. Center for SafeSport, so families know they're not limited to internal channels.
How To Communicate This Without Creating Panic
This is where most directors hesitate. They worry that talking about safeguarding will scare families. That parents will hear "we have a policy about one-on-one interactions" and think "why do they need that policy?"
The opposite is true. Families are already thinking about safety. They're already carrying the question. When a program addresses it directly, the response isn't alarm. It's relief.
The key is framing. You're not announcing that your program has a problem. You're announcing that your program has a standard.
Include a short safeguarding section in your preseason communication. Something like: "The safety of every athlete in our program is our top priority. We follow established safeguarding guidelines that include clear boundaries for coach-athlete communication, policies that minimize one-on-one interactions between adults and minors, and a straightforward reporting process for any concerns. Here's how it works."
Then explain the three pillars in plain, simple language. No legalese. No fear-based framing. Just clarity. "Our coaches communicate with athletes through group channels where parents have visibility. Individual conversations happen in open, observable settings. And if you ever have a concern about any interaction in our program, here's exactly how to report it."
That paragraph takes 30 seconds to read. It answers the question parents were afraid to ask. And it positions your program as one that takes safety seriously enough to build a system around it rather than hoping nothing goes wrong.
The Preseason Moment That Changes Everything
The most powerful safeguarding communication isn't an email or a handbook section. It's a director standing in front of families at the preseason meeting and saying the words out loud.
"Before we get into schedules and snack rotations, I want to talk about something that matters more than any of that. Your child's safety. Here's what we do to protect every athlete in this program."
Two minutes. Cover the three pillars. Tell families where to find the full policy. Tell them who to contact if they ever have a concern. Tell them they will be heard and they will be protected.
That moment creates trust that no registration brochure or website page can match. Because it signals that the director isn't just managing logistics. They're leading with values. And the value they're leading with is the one every parent cares about most.
Coaches should hear the same message in their preseason training. They should understand why the boundaries exist, not as restrictions on their behavior, but as protections for them, the athletes, and the families. A coach who understands that observable interactions protect them from false accusations has a very different relationship with the policy than a coach who feels like they're being treated as a suspect.
Frame it as protection. For everyone. Because that's exactly what it is.
Background Checks Are The Floor, Not The Ceiling
Many programs run background checks on coaches and feel they've checked the safeguarding box. Background checks are necessary. They are also wildly insufficient.
A background check catches someone who has been caught before. It does nothing about someone who hasn't been caught. It does nothing about someone who has never been reported. It does nothing about the gray-area situations that don't rise to the level of a criminal record but absolutely represent boundary violations that should be addressed.
Background checks are the floor. The bare minimum. The starting point. Everything described above, the boundaries, the one-on-one policies, the reporting pathways, is what you build on top of that floor. Together, they create an environment where harm is difficult to perpetrate and impossible to ignore.
When a parent asks "do you run background checks?" the answer should be "yes, and here's what else we do." The "and" is what separates programs that check a box from programs that build a culture of safety.
The Competitive Advantage You Didn't Expect
Directors who implement visible safeguarding systems report something they didn't anticipate. It becomes a differentiator.
In a landscape where most programs say nothing about safety beyond a background check mention, a program that proactively communicates its safeguarding framework stands out. Parents talk about it. They mention it to other families considering your program. "They actually have a whole system for safety. They talked about it at the parent meeting. It made me feel really good about being there."
That's not marketing language. That's word-of-mouth generated by a parent who finally found a program that answered the question they'd been carrying silently for years.
You're not implementing safeguarding for competitive advantage. You're implementing it because it's the right thing to do. But the trust it builds, the confidence it creates, and the reputation it earns are real. And in a world where every program is competing for the same families, being the program that takes safety seriously enough to say it out loud is a powerful position to hold.
Make It Visible, Keep It Simple
Safeguarding works when it's woven into how your program operates, not locked in a filing cabinet.
Post your reporting contacts where families can see them. Include a safeguarding reminder in your seasonal communications. Reference the boundaries in your coach training. Make the policy accessible on your website. Mention it at parent meetings. Not as a warning. As a standard.
The programs that protect kids best aren't the ones with the longest policy documents. They're the ones where every family knows the system exists, every coach understands why it matters, and every athlete experiences an environment where the adults in charge have thought carefully about keeping them safe.
That's the answer to the question parents are afraid to ask. Not "trust us." Not "we'd never let that happen." But "here's our system, it's designed to protect your child, and we'll tell you about it before you ever have to wonder."
Ian Goldberg is the GM of Signature Media and the Editor of the largest and fastest growing sports parenting newsletter. He's been recognized as an industry expert by the National Alliance for Youth Sports, the US Olympic Committee's Truesport, and the Aspen Institute's Project Play. Ian is also a suburban NJ sports dad of two teenage daughters and has over 2,000 hours of volunteer time coaching them (which he calls the most fun form of R&D for his newsletter content). Ian and his team provide players, coaches, parents and program directors with the articles and content they need to have a great sports season. Ian has spent most of his career in digital product development and marketing and got his start at the White House where he worked for the economic advisors to two US Presidents.
