Mike Lunney with Col. Steve O'Donnell

Shop the Sherwin-Williams sale and get 30% off, Duration, Superdeck, and Woodscapes products August 14th through the 24th. Whether you're refreshing your interior or exterior, we've got the colors to bring your vision to life. And with delivery, getting everything to your door is easier than ever. Shop online to have it delivered or visit your neighborhood Sherwin-Williams store. Click the banner to learn more. Retail sales only, some exclusions apply. See Store for Details. Delivery available on qualifying orders. From the Sikonk Supply Hotline, welcome to the Tara Granahan Show, Mr. Michael Looney. Hi, Steve. Good morning. Mike, welcome. Good morning again to our listeners. Mike is the executive director of the Inter-Sclassic League, which oversees the high school sporting events. Falls coming. I know football, soccer, field hockey, and other track. Cross-country is out there. Probably starting practices already. If you want to talk to the listeners about what the league is doing, what's happening, what's new, and then we're going to segue into that to the mental health piece of student athletes and all the good things. I say great things that you guys are doing. at the National League. Yeah, thanks, Steve. Thanks for having me. And I'm actually on the campus of Rhode Island College right now. We're just finishing up our fall athletic director's workshop just in preparation as the schools are making their final preparations to begin fall sports this coming Monday. So I know you had Don Tencher on a little bit earlier, so we were able to see him. And, you know, just a little shout out to him in Rhode Island College for their support of our league. They host many of our championships, as you know, and Don Tenscher has been just a wonderful, you know, person and supporter of the league as well. So, but, yeah, but today we're focusing on the fall athletic directors workshop and, again, leading up to all these seasons, I don't think a lot of people really know that, but, you know, what we do is we meet with all of our coaches in a coach's interpretation meeting. We meet with officials. And again, just there's a lot of preparation and pre-planning that goes on prior to each season. And, you know, we talk about a lot of things, a lot of the initiatives that we have going on that are outside of sports. And then obviously, you know, things like health and safety with heat acclimatization guidelines as, you know, we start our seasons in August and the weather can be very hot. So we want to make sure that health and safety is front of mind when the kids are starting their seasons. So there's just a lot of activity, as you know, as a coach in our league, Steve. There's a lot of things going on in preparation for our seasons. understood and you have thousands of student athletes playing. But let's get right to like mental health issues. I know that you have a program called Inside Out coaching initiative. You have Kyle Kish. You have a lot of things going on at the league.

as on top of. And it's a national conversation about mental health, sports, students. I talked to Don a little bit early, said Don Tencher, about mental health as student athletes. And I heard this story the other day. We were an athletic director who our administrator was walking to a building and talked to a young woman on a college campus. And she was distressed, just trying to figure out all that they have to accomplish athletically, all they have to accomplish academically. And some of them are self-initiated pressures, but there's pressure on younger people to thrive in every single environment in the different formats and then parents. So I know high school is different from college. When it comes to parents, they turn 18, they're kind of their own. But for high school, how are you managing that with other schools? and pushing the message out. I know you mentioned there's a forum coming up at Gillette Stadium. Yeah, so there's a couple of different things. The first part with mental health, it's such a huge topic, not only in Rhode Island, but all across the country. And, again, when we collaborate with other states and talk about those pressures that you're talking about with high school kids, again, there's a lot of pressure on just going through their academic rigor to get themselves ready for college or... if it's not college, the military, or trades, or anything like that. And, you know, kids right now, there's just so much. over-scheduling that goes on with them, not just with athletics, but just everything that's going on with their lives. So we have to be aware of those things in our space. And, you know, as an organization, we work really hard at providing support and resources for our member schools so that they can enhance their programs and what they provide kids, you know, every day. The first thing that initiative that we've done the last few years is a mental health summit. And it's actually held here at Rhode Island College in January. And it's in partnership with the Kyle Cares Foundation. And again, that's a group that we've worked with. We bring in national speakers. We have breakout sessions. And to talk about the importance of this topic, when we put this out to schools, and again, all these things are at no cost to our schools when we bring it to them. But to talk about that topic and how important it is out there, it's one of the most popular and well-attended conferences that we have every single year. And we'll have well over 200 kids. academic advisors and different people that come together for a whole day workshop to talk about mental health and how to deal with that. So certainly something that we want to focus on and provide those schools, those resources that can help kids. And when you do that, is it mandatory training or is it voluntary?

No, it's not mandatory, but we, again, we offer many, many different opportunities, you know, to do things. Again, we're in a space called educational-based, school-based athletics. So, you know, we are tie everything to learning, and sports and schools are supposed to be to connect. kids to schools and give them a sense of belonging and obviously to be able to educate them, not just in the sports realm, but outside of that as well. So we always say that we're trying to get the kids ready for their next level of life, not athletics. So again, it's not mandatory, but again, when you see the schools participate voluntarily in this, you know it's a big topic and something that we need to do more of. Understood. How about your student ambassador program? Yeah, so through the National Federation of High Schools, again, it's one thing that we're launching this year. They do a number of online free courses for kids around leadership and different things. So the NFHS has come up with a student credential, what they're calling. So when the kids take three of those NFHS online courses, they get an NFHS national student credential. And what we're going to do is use that as a prerequisite to become a student ambassador out there for the interest scholastic league. So again, when they're looking for things to do, put on their college resumes, when they're applying to colleges and different things, you know, we're going to try to do as much as we can to give them leadership opportunities and chances to learn. So with that national credential, You know, they can become a student ambassador for the league. And then that would give us the opportunity to kind of talk about some of the initiatives that we have and push out some grassroots type of campaigns that we'd like them to take advantage of. What would you do if your online store converted 36% more shoppers? You could take 36% more vacation. Another pinacolada? Yes, please. Open a new retail location. With 36% more square feet. Fantastic. Hire 36% more help. You're hired and you're hired. Shopify has the world's best converting checkout up to 36% better than other e-commerce platforms. What you do with those extra sales is up to you. Switch to Shopify today at Shopify.com slash listen and get a $1 trial. Shopify.com slash listen. Oil field work is dangerous, even under the best conditions. But when companies cut corners or ignore safety, it's the workers who pay the price. One accident can mean catastrophic injuries, lost income, and a long road to recovery. At Morrison-Duit injury lawyers, we have the resources and experience to handle oil field injury cases and stand by workers and their families through the legal process. Real cases, real injuries. Morris and DeWitt injury lawyers. Paid spokesperson, Trey Morris, Shreveport, L.A. 251956.

Mike Drop, hosted by former Navy CEO, Mike Ridland. What is your take? Was it what you expected? Oh, it was the best thing ever. It was something I always wanted to do. If you show me a clear goal, I'm like, okay, I can do that. Master Chief. He's like, you realize there's about 1% chance that you're making a 3%. That's all I need Master Chief. My platoon went home early, and I just went up to my chief, and I was like, I'm not going home. Turns out I'm staying. That's when we go to war. Yeah, I was like, okay, I could get used to this. Mike Drop, follow and listen on your favorite platform. I don't know if you can answer this question, Mike, but I noticed this, obviously, you do two students from freshmen to seniors. They think differently. And I watched our older student athletes deal with our younger athletes. And I find sometimes the older ones forgot that they were 15 once, that they were, you know, immature. I wouldn't say mature, but new. And they're new to the schools, new to the system. They're the... junior person on a sports team and realizing the pressures that when you walk into a school that, you know, if it's soccer, football, order of the sport may be, you know, you have to perform and then you then making friends and you're mixing up. There's a specific training for like a freshman that's different from training for mental health to a senior. Well, again, we promote the National Federation of High Schools, their NFHS learn courses, and there's a number of things about connecting them to, you know, academic skills. So, again, depending on where they are in their development, there's a lot of opportunities for them there. But mostly we rely on our coaches to be that front line, as you know, as you're a coach of a great program at LaSalle. You know, your contact with the kids every day is so important to their development. You know, in many ways, you know, our coaches spend more time with their athletes than our teachers do in the schools. So there's a lot of opportunities, and we like to say that we want our coaches to teach. mentor and equip kids, you know, with skills that they can use throughout their lives. So, you know, our coaches are on the front lines and that's why we try to engage with administrators and athletic directors to make sure that, you know, when they're hiring coaches, that that's messaging that they are getting down to the kids level. Mike, appreciate it. Mike, appreciate it. Have a great weekend. I appreciate you spending some time telling people about what's happening with the league. Good luck with all the fall sports and we'll see you soon. Thanks so much for having me, Steve. You're welcome. Mike Drop, hosted by former Navy SEAL, Mike Ridland. What is your take? Was it what you expected? Oh, it was the best thing ever. It was something I always wanted to do. If you show me a clear goal, I'm like, okay, I can do that. Master Chief. He's like, you realize there's about 1% chance that you're making a 3%. That's all I need Master Chief. My platoon went home early, and I just went up to my chief, and I was like, I'm not going home. Turns out I'm staying. That's when we go to war. Yeah, I was like, okay, I could get used to this. Mike Drop, follow and listen on your favorite platform.