4 the Health of it!
4 the Health of it!
4 the Health of it! ft We Work Hard MS
On this episode of 4 the Health of it, I sit down with the Harris family owners and operators of We Work Hard MS. Both Jonathan and Tamika are educators and coaches.
Welcome to For the Health of It. I'm your host, Corian KPAD Paget, and this is your number one source for all things sports, health, and fitness related. Oh, hold on, coach. What does for the health of it stand for? Good question, Austin. The for and for the health of it stands for our four principles, which are mindset, movement, nutrition, and recovery. Okay, cool. Let's do it for the health of it then. Welcome to another edition of For the Health of It. Today I have with me the Harris family. Uh they own and operate We Work Hard Mississippi. Uh, I like to call this family a story of hard work, education, and love. And they also have today their son Jonathan Jr. Jonathan, how are you doing, sir?
SPEAKER_02:I'm doing great.
SPEAKER_03:Good, good, good. Man, I know you're a little bit of an athlete, like both of your parents, and uh you were very well educated. So I gotta ask you, what do you want to be when you grow up?
SPEAKER_01:A football player, and if that does not work out, I want to be a teacher.
SPEAKER_03:Okay, football player and teacher. Gotcha, gotcha, gotcha. Okay. Uh, where would you, if you could choose any school to go to, what school would you want to go to?
SPEAKER_01:The school at uh Jackson State for College.
SPEAKER_03:Okay, all right, yeah, that's that's exactly what I was looking for. All right. Uh my next question is what are your favorite sports?
SPEAKER_01:Baseball, if it's in person, football, basketball, and a little bit of soccer. Okay, okay.
SPEAKER_03:Baseball is a little boring. I can't watch it on TV myself. But uh, who's your favorite baseball team?
SPEAKER_02:The Yankees.
SPEAKER_03:Yankees? Okay, I thought you were gonna say the Braves. Okay, all right now. Here's my question. I've been waiting to ask you for a long time. Who are your favorite wrestlers?
SPEAKER_02:My favorite wrestlers of all time would be Stone Cold Steve Austin, and for right now is Xavier Woods.
SPEAKER_03:Really? Why is Xavier Woods?
SPEAKER_02:Because he's smoothing the ring. Okay, all right, cool, cool, cool.
SPEAKER_03:All right, well, if it's all right with you, I'm gonna bring your parents in now. Is that cool with you?
SPEAKER_00:Yep.
SPEAKER_03:All right, appreciate you. All right, all right, now we got Jonathan Sr. and uh Tamika Harris. So uh before we get too far into it, I want to mention how I met both of you. I met Tamika uh at Jim Hill. We both work together. She's the girls' track coach and the head cheerleading coach, and then I'm the boys' track coach, and obviously I met her husband through her. Uh but if y'all believe in the seven degrees of separation, uh, me and her husband both share a childhood friend. He grew up in New Orleans, and uh we ended up knowing the same guy. Uh so yeah, crazy, crazy small world. But let's go ahead and get into it. Uh, like I mentioned, country is from New Orleans. Tamika, you are from uh you are from Atlanta. You both ended up at JSU. Can y'all tell me how y'all each got to JSU?
SPEAKER_05:Uh well, I guess I'll go first. It's uh actually one of those funny stories. I guess it was just destined to be. Initially, I was going to go to Tennessee State University. Um, I always wanted to go to an HBCU. Um, so I applied to Tennessee State University. I was awarded a full scholarship, and in my scholarship letter, they told me that I received a full academic scholarship, but they didn't have any money to fund academic scholarships. So that actually went out the water. I had an awesome guidance counselor, which is how I ended up being a counselor, um, Dr. Dinkins at Creekside High School. He actually told me about Jackson State University. He actually introduced me to the SWAC, um, other than Southern and Grambling. I didn't know any of the other schools. So he told me about Jackson State. He said, go ahead and apply and you know see what happens. So I applied. I got in, I received a presidential scholarship, which paid for everything. So even though I didn't uh know too much about Mississippi or Jackson State, they brought me in kind of on an academic uh visit uh when they did a scholarship reception for all the presidential scholars. I actually had my best friend at the time. Well, she's still my best friend, she actually applied too. I was like, hey girl, I'm applying to Jackson State. It's in Mississippi. Uh I need someone to come with me, so I'm gonna need you to apply too. So she applied, she got in, she received the presidential scholarship. We came down for the scholarship banquet, and Linda Rush, who was over Tiger Pride at the time, was instrumental in basically being like our mom away from home. So that's how I ended up in Jackson.
SPEAKER_00:Cool, cool, cool.
SPEAKER_03:What about you, Contra?
SPEAKER_00:Well, my story is a little different from Tamika's. Um, I actually ended up in Jackson because I always tell people it's because I told my ACL. Uh-huh. Right. So I was um actually offered a scholarship to go to LSU, and that's where I was going. I told my ACL, second to last game of my high school career, and they took back their scholarship. So at that point in time, you know, I'm trying to figure out where I needed to go, where I wanted to go. And Jackson State track coach is the actually one who came and um offered me a scholarship through my summer track coach, Coach Canada, introduced me to Dr. Edmond Donald. So he came through and he offered me a scholarship, and then a couple of my teammates had already gone to Jackson City. So it was kind of like, you know, let me go ahead and try this out. Right. And I ended up in Jackson and probably made the best decision of my life to come to Jackson.
SPEAKER_03:Cool, cool, cool. So when did y'all meet?
SPEAKER_05:So we met uh my junior year, your sophomore year. Yeah, yeah. That sounds about right. So in actuality, got a little spiller going on. So he ended up getting hurt again in college. Okay, and um, he ended up being red-shirted. And so one of his friends from uh back home in New Orleans, Darnesha, shout out to Darnesha. Um, she actually was like, Well, I mean, you can't play football, so you might as well come on and uh be on the cheerleading team. And somehow she convinced him to go ahead and be on the cheerleading team. I really uh think it was his way to get to the sidelines, but hey, we'll talk about that at another time. So that's actually how we met. We met, I met him on the cheerleading squad at Jackson State. I was already there, I had already been uh cheering for Jackson State. Um, I didn't like him at first, I'm just gonna be honest. But uh we ended up uh the road trip to Indianapolis. We played in the Circle City Classic. And so the bus ride, we actually got to sit down and have a conversation, and that's when we, you know, really kicked things off.
SPEAKER_00:So cool, cool, cool. That's absurd. It was neutral. I didn't like her either.
SPEAKER_05:So it's okay.
SPEAKER_00:Right. Uh you know, so that's definitely how it happened.
SPEAKER_03:Okay. So, country, you you you went there for football and you ended up doing cheerleading and track also?
SPEAKER_00:Right. So I did football. Well, actually, this is the exact order it went in, right? I cheered, then I played football, and then of course I was doing track at the same time. I actually stopped playing football when Coach Bell was there. Right. Because me and him didn't get along. All right. So I came off of the football team for my junior year, and I just did track. Then I went back my senior year, started with all conference, and uh came back with Coach Comedy for his first year. So I had a crazy, crazy role. I never played consecutive years of football while I was in college, but I still played enough to put my name in the record book, you know.
SPEAKER_03:Right, right. Okay, so uh what did what did each one of you major in?
SPEAKER_00:Oh, I majored in English education, and I majored in health, physical education, and recreation for the minor in biology.
SPEAKER_03:Okay, all right, all right. So uh how long have you been coaching?
SPEAKER_05:So this is my 16th year in JPS. So I have been coaching for 16 years. I coached cheerleading at Blackburn Middle School for seven years, I coached girls' track there for six years, and then this is my ninth year at Jim Hill, and I've been coaching girls track and cheerleading the entire nine years, and then for the last year that I was at Blackburn Middle School, I also coached uh Jackson State's cheer squad uh that last year. Um yeah, but I was pregnant at the time, so then I stopped doing that, and then I ended up at Jim Hill, and that took up a lot of time, so I've done middle school, high school, and uh college.
SPEAKER_00:Um I started I started my coaching career soon after I graduated from my senior year. So I played my senior year in football, and then I didn't have any more years left in track. So I was a graduate assistant and I coached track and field that that year. And I coached that since 2007, right? So I've been in Jackson State University coaching there since 2007. Um I went from being part-time to being now full-time at the university. So just to go back a little bit, during that time period, I was um employed with the Mississippi Department of Wildlife Fishery and Parks. So I was an education biologist there for nine years. So I taught there from eight to five. Then I came over to Jackson State and coached after that and in the morning time between that. So I was part-time at Jackson State and I was full-time with the Mississippi Department of Wildlife Fishering.
SPEAKER_03:Wow. That is cool. I I did not know that. I'm glad I'm having this conversation with y'all. All right, so how did you well, we kind of went into this, but how did you get into coaching, country? Uh you said you alluded to it a little bit that you ran out of your eligibility for track, but how did you get into uh go ahead?
SPEAKER_00:So essentially, every coach that I've had always tell me you're a coach on the field. You're a coach, you know, you sec my assistant coach. So it comes naturally to me to try to help everybody get to the level in which I think we all need to be at. And then secondly, um I I I got into coaching when I was in um college, I didn't have a coach.
SPEAKER_03:Right.
SPEAKER_00:I coach didn't coach field events, all right. So if you know anything about HBCUs, it's a limited amount of staff that we're gonna be allowed to. So that means if you have a coach that needs to be well-rounded, because you're gonna probably have to coach everything, right? But coach knew that I was able to self-function, to kind of coach myself per se. So when he when he gave me my scholarship, he said, son, I don't have a coach to coach you, but I believe you can do what needs to be done in order to make it move. Right. So while I was there, I coached everybody else on the team. So I was coaching as competing. So I'm like Bill Russell, you know, a player coach. That's kind of how I went. So I kind of started my coaching there, right? So it just kept gradually growing, growing. Then we started the Mississippi track stars. So that's a separate line of coaching that we had, our summer track team that we had for 10 years, 11, 11 years. And then I went into Jackson State and obviously started coaching, and that's that's kind of how I moved into it. So I kind of say I was groomed and forced into a job at the same time.
SPEAKER_03:Gotcha, you gotcha. I understand that. Uh, before we get into you, Tamika, can we talk about the Mississippi Track Stars? How did that come about?
SPEAKER_00:So the Mississippi Track Stars, it started with me and my friends. It was three of us initially that started it, and then I drugged my wife into it. You know, she was there. She's a trooper now. Never again. That's a long time. But we started it to so we can create opportunities in the Jackson area for kids to go to college. Right? All of us got to college basically based off of summer track in some type of way, right? So we we noticed that it was a dire need for it in the Jackson area, they didn't have any. Right. So we started that to to give kids opportunities to you know better themselves and get out to college and and see the world. So we did that. I can't remember the exact number. We sent to college. I can't remember, but I know it's close to 30. And I'll just leave it there. Kids that we actually sent to college on scholarships.
SPEAKER_03:Right.
SPEAKER_00:So that's that was the purpose of our program. It's to is to get them exposure. We took them everywhere across the country. And they competed throughout the summer and they did well, and they ranked in the nation and everything. But that's the reason why we started, and it's still going to this day. A couple of my former athletes have taken it over. I kind of had to step away from it because it started to get bigger than what I can actually handle with my full-time uh coaching with Jackson State and Tamika with her chili eating and stuff. It started running everything into it, so we had to kind of step back from it a little bit. But I'm still there. It's coaching meritus. And I make sure I come over and tell them what I need to tell them during that time period, and but we still make it work. You know, when she let me sneak out there, I sneak out there to practice.
SPEAKER_03:Okay. I love it. I'm loving it. All right, uh, Tamik, how about you? How did you get into coaching?
SPEAKER_05:Uh, so I guess like him, I was groomed as well. I say that God gave me the talent of natural-born leadership, which is a gift and a curse at times. But um, so when I started at Blackburn, I actually did my student teaching at Blackburn. And before my student teaching was finished, the principal at the time offered me a full-time teaching position. I actually had not planned on staying in Jackson. I had actually gotten accepted into grad school at Auburn and the University of Alabama at Birmingham. So I had actually intended to go to graduate school at Auburn when they offered me a full-time teaching position. I was like, well, I mean, I could go ahead and start my teaching career now and just work graduate school into it. So I actually I accepted the job, of course, ended up doing grad school at Jackson State extra part-time. I call it extra part-time. I took maybe like one or two classes a semester here and there until I received my master's degree. So uh when I when I was doing my student teaching, I would kind of help the cheerleaders there. And so I asked them, you know, if I come on, you know, do you already have uh a cheerleading coach? And they were like, well, no, we really will want you to come on and be the cheerleading coach. And I was like, okay, great. And they had a track coach at the time. Um, and so my first year I just did cheer. I believe it was my second year there. The track coach at the time, he did boys and girls track, Coach Payne. He actually asked me to come on. Um, if I was interested, I was like, Yeah, I'm interested. Uh, I didn't really know about the coaching aspect of track. I knew what it took to coach cheer, right? But I was a little unsure of track, but I knew I had a track guru here, and if I needed some help, I had a track encyclopedia. So he actually just had me come on more so as like a chaperone as opposed to necessarily a coach.
SPEAKER_03:Right.
SPEAKER_05:Coach so he could have that female, you know, present to help with the females. And then after a year of that, he stepped down and I was able to take over full time and fell in love with coach and track, just like I love coach and cheer. So that's how that happened. And then when I did my interview at Jim Hill, my when you know, when you do an interview and they ask you, you know, do you have any questions for us? My question was, Do you need a cheer and track coach? Because I only want to go to a school where I can coach, cheer, and track. And lo and behold, they had an availability for a girls track coach and a cheer coach, and that's how I ended up.
SPEAKER_03:Good deal, man. That's what's up. That is what's up. Uh, how long have y'all been together? How long have y'all been married?
SPEAKER_05:What you looking at me?
SPEAKER_00:I just want to make sure because I asked you this the other day.
SPEAKER_05:You wanna answer?
SPEAKER_00:No, you answer.
SPEAKER_05:We've been married for 12 years and we've been together for 17 years. I know we look very youthful and baby face, but you know, we've been married for 12. We're an old married couple.
SPEAKER_03:Gotcha, gotcha. True inspiration. I hope to get there one day. All right, uh, how do you maintain both sports along with being a spouse, a parent, and counselor?
SPEAKER_05:Very tipidly. It is definitely um a juggling act and a balancing act. So what had to happen, and that's what you learn as you kind of get older and you've been uh you become an old married couple. But what happens now is as we've gotten older, we make sure that the other person has our schedules so that uh I know when his I have all his track meets in my phone, and then when we have when we get the football schedule and the basketball schedule, I post them on the refrigerator. So that way we know, like when I when people invite me to gatherings or when stuff is going on, then I always check my calendar and I check his calendar. So I try not to schedule too much stuff um during track season on the weekends. He's going to be home because he's gone a lot of weekends. So the weekends he is there. We kind of try to reserve that for family time. So he doesn't really schedule things on his off weekends during track season, and I don't really schedule outside things during the off weekends uh during track season. So and and he still tells me I need to learn to say no more, but I do say no a lot more than I used to in the past. So like every every exhibition game, every tournament, whereas when I first started, we were going to everything. Right now I have to say no. You know, I have a husband and a child, so yeah, we're gonna we're gonna do what we're supposed to do, but we can't necessarily take on all of these extras. And if I do um take on extra, like I said, if it's during track season, because that's the time when we're both out and traveling, then I do it on his away weekends. Now, football season is a little different. We're at home, we're season ticket holders at Jackson State games. So like football season is like our season. That's us. We're going to all the games together, you know, we're doing all the family stuff. Junior's birthday is during that season, Christmas. So fall is is good. Uh spring is where we really work on our our balancing act. And then um going into the new year, I have developed uh a schedule as far as balancing the counseling work as well. I actually um so basically what I do is I try to handle coaching things uh after hours.
SPEAKER_03:Gotcha.
SPEAKER_05:So it's like a couple hours in between, like when he may still be practicing or whatever, but it's after school time where I do the administrative work to the coaching because you know that could take on a life in and of itself.
SPEAKER_03:Yes, indeed. Yes. Uh you mentioned JSU football. Uh this was not on the schedule, but how do y'all feel about Coach Prime?
SPEAKER_04:Go for it, man.
SPEAKER_00:I'm gonna tell you, I'm I'm super excited. I'm ecstatic at the possibilities of making sure that everybody's speaking about Jackson State. Right? Since we're out of town now, right? We're in the ATT store, people talking about Jackson State. They didn't know we were from Jackson, they didn't know I was employed at Jackson State. Right. But Jackson State came up in conversation, and that's what we need. We need it to be a household name so everybody can understand that we have something to offer. You come down to Jackson, you come to Jackson State, you can better your life. You know, so that's what I'm excited about, the possibilities. Now, the football side, it's gonna do what it's gonna do. You know what I mean? So it's gonna make sure everything is working, and I know Coach Prime is gonna come out there and get those balls ready to play. You know, but the the bigger aspect, the bigger picture of it, it's excellent for the city. It's excellent for the state, right? We're getting buzz to the city and the state that as much as needed, so we can kind of get some things moving around there. So that's where everything's going, and hopefully that direction just keeps going to the top.
SPEAKER_03:True, that I know uh me and Tamika both working at Jim Hill, it just makes me want to take my game and make sure everything I do is at least part, bare minimum part. Uh you never know, Coach Prime might come over, or anybody else might come over and just check out what we're doing that day. So I definitely gotta make sure we gotta be on our top of our game.
SPEAKER_00:That's one thing we go for sure. He's gonna come in the community now.
SPEAKER_03:Oh, yeah, definitely.
SPEAKER_00:He's gonna he's gonna stop around. So just make sure, uh, like you say, as long as you stay ready or get ready.
SPEAKER_03:There we go. Uh uh well, what about you, country? That uh how do you maintain that balance?
SPEAKER_00:Listen, I'm gonna tell you, I had to take a step back. The biggest thing I did was when I took myself out the equation of the summer track team, right? When I took myself out the equation of Mississippi track stars, that was a a planned and thought about decision, right? I actually thought about my retirement for two years and I kept coming back off it. You know what I mean? Because my whole thing is I still got some more kids I gotta get out. I still, and then I thought about it, it's gonna keep happening. You know what I mean? I'm still gonna, I'm always gonna have that psych of the kids. So at some point in time, I have to step away from it because I realized it was taking so much of our time as far as free time for the family. Because, you know, Junior says, hey daddy, I want to go do blah, blah, blah. And I'll be like, nah, son, we gotta go to this track meet, stay all day for three, three days straight. And you know, that's he ain't really trying to hear that. And I don't think I need to deprive him from that. So, and you know, to me, I definitely have to give her her time so we can go, because my wife loves to travel. And let me say that again, loves to travel. So I know that means we had to get on the plane somewhere and go somewhere, you know, so we can make it move. So, with that thought process, I made sure to, you know, let me go ahead and map out some time. And time management is the key, you know. So we just gotta make sure when we get that time, we're effectively using that time. So that's basically what I did. I just kind of prioritized what was really important and just moved on from there.
SPEAKER_03:Okay. All right. So uh what advice would you have for any any aspiring coaches?
SPEAKER_05:So advice for aspiring coaches. There were two things that he talked about that are extremely important when you're coaching. That's time management, um, is prioritizing. And then I hope this wasn't what you were gonna say, but I know we both feel the same way is that you can't coach a kid until a kid knows you care about them. So that's actually the number one thing. Um, you can you can coach people or attempt to coach people all day, but the results don't come until the kids know that you care. And um times change and generations change. When I initially came into coaching, you may have gotten away with you know, just giving them the workout, do this, you know, step one, two, three, four. But as you continue to grow, um, you have to adapt. That's my second bit of advice. You have to adapt. You can't coach. I don't coach in the COVID times the same way I coached the last school year. I didn't coach last school year the same way I coached when I first started coaching. So adapting to change and uh making sure that your athletes know that you care.
SPEAKER_00:And not to, you know, you're gonna probably hear some of the same things, but I'm gonna say it's just a little bit different, right? You can't coach the event, you have to coach the athlete, right? So I'm gonna say that again. You can't coach the event, you can't coach the activity, you have to coach the athlete. Because every athlete is different, right? Every athlete doesn't always conform to the cookie-cutter way of doing something. So you have to figure out what triggers them and what makes them move and what makes them motivated to do whatever they need to do. Motivation is always the key to success. Somebody's motivated to do something, you can kind of make sure they put them in the right track to do what they need to do. Um, second thing is you definitely have to be adjustable and flexible, right? Adaptation like Tamiga was talking about, and willing to step back and change if you don't see something's going right. Right. The biggest thing that coaches do, and I know this is a lot around in this area, they're gonna keep drilling it even if it don't work, right? And that just makes no sense. You know what I mean? So sometimes you have to take a step back from your ego and do it. Every year at the end of the year, I evaluate my workouts. I evaluate what was done right, I evaluate what was done wrong, and I look and see, well, what can I change here? So every year I'm evolving as a coach, right? And coaching education is big. You have to keep learning. There's always something new that might come out there, right? Just to listen to somebody else's point of view, something that you haven't thought about before might help you get to that next level, right? College coaches do it all the time. We have supposed all the time that we sit and listen to each other talk and listen to what you're doing in a day. Now, what he's doing might not work for you, right? But you might hear something in his process that says, Hey, let me think about doing this, and then modify it to what I have as a team, you know. So that's that's one of the biggest things. Coaching education. We just got to make sure we get that done.
SPEAKER_03:Okay. All right. Uh what is your why?
SPEAKER_00:I'm gonna have to hit that question again and kind of cut off.
SPEAKER_03:Okay. What is your why? So uh Tamika knows when uh Mr. Brown came in, he uh he was that was what he was heavy on. You know, we're all teachers, but why do we teach? So what is your why to what you do?
SPEAKER_05:So the why to what I do is to expose the students and the community that I'm in to new and different experiences and to teach them to push beyond their limits because it's easy to get pigeonholed, especially when you work in a in an urban setting, it's easy to get pigeonholed into what people believe you can do and what you can't do. And I always try to tell not just my athletes, but my students to succeed in spite of, not to give in because of. Like which person are you gonna be? Are you going to exceed and excel in spite of your circumstances, or are you gonna fold and you know be disappointed because of? We can blame our circumstance or we can move beyond our circumstance. So that's my why.
SPEAKER_00:And my why would be I have an innate desire within myself to make sure that everybody achieves greatness around me, right? Like that's one of my biggest fight. I tell my kids all the time, I say I this is a good day to be great, you know, and I really want you to understand that you have an inside of you. Now, the question is, what are you gonna do to get it out of you? You know, so that's one of my pushing things. I just want to make sure I'm giving opportunities to people who are willing to work and willing to grind and willing to go to make that next step. I tell most of them, I say, y'all probably never see an Olympics, right? But I guarantee you're gonna have a college degree, and the only thing I'm asking you to do is pay it forward, pay it forward to the next person. So that's my thing. I just want to push the next generation, try to create some good young men, good young women, and put them out there in this world and hopefully it could just keep on pushing and then, you know, everybody getting to that goal that they set for themselves.
SPEAKER_05:And to follow up, that was one of the the biggest things with the Mississippi track stars and why it did take so long to turn it over to someone else, because we had so many kids who had, I mean, they had been on track teams or, you know, played organized sports, but had never been outside of the city of Jackson. Like the furthest they may have gone was to Pearl or Clinton or Brandon, and that was to play a game. So being able to take them, I mean, just for because the way summer track works, especially back then, because like you said, there really weren't any teams in this area. So whereas now they have summer track meets, you know, in Pearl or in Madison, they didn't have those when we first started. Every track meet was in Louisiana or Alabama. So just for them to go next door to Louisiana was like amazing. Then when you talk about taking kids from this setting who have never been outside of Jackson, and now you're taking them to Junior Olympics, you're not just taking them so they can see it, you're taking them so they can actually compete and be competitive. It was it was awesome. Even when I got to uh Jim Hill, when I first got there, um after the first couple years, we used to go to uh Trek Meets at Ole Miss and Mississippi State and USM, and we were we were young and inexperienced, and the kids used to be like, Coach, why are you bringing us here? Oh my gosh, they're like state champions, and we're just getting started. And I said, Well, to beat, you know, to beat the best, you have to beat the best. So giving them that exposure, it takes the mystique and the stigma out of it, and it lets them know that you know they can be champions. Because when you you get kids who have never been outside of their city, a lot of times they feel like, you know, people from other areas already have a leg up and that's what they're supposed to do. And because of where they come from, you know, that's that's not what I'm supposed to do. So giving them those opportunities allows them to see that it is absolutely possible I be on that podium and that I can go to college for this and I can exceed and excel.
SPEAKER_00:Definitely breaking that stigmatism, you know, breaking that that when those kids left out of there, you can see the change in their demeanor. Right? When you when they came back, you were like, oh, it's other things other than Jackson. People live differently, other places, they do things differently, other places, they talk differently, other places, you know what I mean? Like the first day they came back, man, you really talk that is something that you have to, you know, understand that everybody doesn't do things the same way. And just having that eye-opening experience for those kids, I guarantee push them probably even more to achieve the goals that they have achieved.
SPEAKER_05:And to push their school teammates because then they go to school. We probably made some coaches mad because then they they go to school and be like, that's not what we do at summer trade.
SPEAKER_04:Right.
SPEAKER_05:No, you think that's fast. Nah, that's not fast. Go run against those kids from Louisiana, you'll see fast. So I mean, they took it, it was something they carry, they carry with them and became a part of them.
SPEAKER_03:Cool, cool, cool. That's why I like to hear it. So uh, excuse the interruption. It's me, K-Pad. And I just want to say thank you for tuning in and listening to For the Health of It on whatever streaming service you choose. Be sure to subscribe and give us a good rating. Now back to the show. All right, so uh I love your your wise, beautiful wise, uh, very inspirational and inspiring. Uh so you got on your shirts that says we work hard. Tell me about your family business and why you started it up.
SPEAKER_05:So basically, it comes off the same premise as we both have as it relates to coaching. Um, it's actually something that's been in the work for a few years, and a good friend of mine kept saying, you know, when are you all going to really get started and really, you know, give your knowledge back out to the community? So, I mean, COVID happened and it was as best, as good of a time as any to go ahead and get started. And it's the same premise. The reason why we started the business is to basically do the same thing that we did with the Mississippi track stars, but on a broader scale and to start younger. So, what we see a lot of times in our encounters is that um kids from certain demographics like where we are right now, um they kind of get a late start on the technical side of sports. Great talent, lots of potential and ability, but they get a late start on the technical side of it. Whereas, you know, people from other areas may have, you know, private coaches, personal trainers, or even just have those who give them the foundational aspects. A lot of times our kids don't start getting the technical stuff until they get into high school.
SPEAKER_04:Right.
SPEAKER_05:And in some cases, well, in many cases, that's late. So the reason that we started this is so that kids can start getting the technical training, learning the basics, the fundamentals, get the foundation from a young age, five, six, you know, elementary school and middle school, and you know, so that by the time they get to high school, you know, they're ready. And then also on the other side of it to provide them with information that they may need for the next level. Because a lot of times, you know, kids just know, you know, I want to play sports and I want to go to college for sports. And as a high school guidance counselor, I have to sit down and have conversations with student athletes all the time and ask them, you know, well, specifically what school do you want to go to? Okay, well, do you know the admission requirements for that school aside from NCAA requirements? Then do you know the NCAA requirements? Do you know, you know, which classes actually count towards your core GPA? You know, we've had athletes that, you know, their their cumulative GPA says one thing, but their core GPA says another. So then you have to have those tough conversations. So all of that played a part in us saying, okay, between the two of us, we have 30 plus years of experience coaching. We've both been student athletes. Um, you know, we have all of this knowledge that we want to give starting at a young age to help kids in the community. Okay. Just to level the playing field.
SPEAKER_03:I like it. I like it. So, what all services do y'all offer?
SPEAKER_05:So we I call it personal training and private coaching. And a lot of times when people hear personal training, then you know, they think of, you know, adults who go to the gym, you had that personal trainer, like, come on, and they develop workout square. But when I say personal training, what we mean is we're training and preparing your youth to develop the skills necessary for the specific sports that they are thinking about. It also gives you, if you start them young enough, then it gives them time to decide if that's even for them. For example, um, even though we did the Mystic Track Stars for 11 years, and Junior was a large part of that. A lot of people assume he wants to do track. Well, he saw that he was inundated with and ingrained with it. He has no desire to be on a track team. A lot of kids may say they want to run track. So if you go ahead and bring them out there, once they've had one of Coach Country's workouts, they'll know whether or not they really want to, you know, do track. Um, and but it's not just track. I mean, I am blessed to marry someone with a vast knowledge of all sports. So he can get you together in all sports. Of course, um, where I come in, my specific knowledge, uh, sports specific knowledge deals with track and field and cheer. So on the private coaching side, then we also offer uh cheer camps, cheer clinics. You know, a cheer clinic would be if you just wanted somebody to come in one day for a couple hours and work on something specifically with your team, you know, I can provide that for you. Or if you want a multi-day camp, I have a couple of relationships with a couple of schools now where each summer I do their summer camp. That's what I do. They call me and they say, hey coach, you know, when can you schedule us in? And we go ahead and get that done. We're going to be branching out to even work on uh cheer trials. So we'll actually develop your trial material for you. Give you a whole tryout kit, we'll uh create the material for you, we'll get it taught for those people trying out, and we'll even provide you with judges so you really don't have to do anything but take the scores and pick your squad at the end. We'll take care of the whole tryout process for you.
SPEAKER_03:So oh, that's dope. That's dope. Okay, uh you mentioned cheer. Can you tell me about the different cheer associations and the different types of cheerleading?
SPEAKER_05:So varsity spirit brands is the largest organization related to cheer. So varsity spirit brands encompasses camps, they encompass chair competitions, they encompass apparel, basically any and everything. Your two basic style types of cheer will be all-star cheer and uh school cheer. So school cheer is a lot of times deemed as a spirit squad. So those are the cheerleaders that you see performing on the sidelines at your games. Now, school cheer also breaks down into school cheer or spirit squads and competitive squads. Competition squads, uh, they'll actually go to competitions. That's what you see on ESPN. That's what uh piqued my interest was watching cheer competitions on ESPN. Then there's uh recreational chair, so those are your little league teams, they have cheerleaders as it relates to them. So Varsity is the biggest brand. You also have other brands. You have USA Cheer, which is a brand and association related uh to cheer. They deal a lot with college cheer as well. I do want to take a little time to talk about USA cheer because under USA Cheer, they have developed a subset of cheer called stunt. There's an ongoing battle as to whether uh cheerleaders are athletes and cheerleading is a sport. So many people recognize competitive cheerleading as a sport. Cheerleaders are athletes. Whether you deem cheerleading as a sport or not is up to debate depending on where you are and what your squad does. So USA Cheer has actually developed a subset called Stunt, which is actually in the 2021 NCAA cycle is going to be voted on, but the NCAA has recognized it as an official emerging women's sport. So the 2021 cycle, they're going to officially um decide on whether or not stunt S T-U-N-T will be a sport. It was designed and designated so that it could become a sport. It actually has four quarters. It's two teams competing head to head. There are four quarters, so each quarter talks about something different. One is uh partner stunts, one is jumps and tumblings, one is tosses and pyramids, and then the final quarter is uh like a team routine. So you go head to head, you have two teams, they get on the mat, they do the exact same skills. The judges score them, and whoever scores the highest, they get a point. The team with the highest point told at the end is declared a winner. So, based on the structure of it, it does follow the format of a sport. So there are um the University of Kentucky right now is the only uh school. Well, the last time I checked, they were the only school in the SEC that uh had it. But there are about 22 colleges around the country. There are none in the South as of right now. Um, no southern states, no schools, no colleges in the southern states officially have a team, but there are several schools and other regions who have actually developed stunt teams who actually compete. So there's an even more competitive side of cheer that goes along with that. Outside of RC, there are other ones. Like I said, there's USA Cheer, there's Powerhouse Spirit, which is taking a reign as it relates to uh Stomp and Shake. There's UFIT Cheer and Dance, which is also in the Stomp and Shake uh realm. So different associations and a whole lot of different types, it just depends on how much you want to get involved and what type of cheerleading you uh want to do.
SPEAKER_03:Okay, cool, cool, cool. And uh my last question for you, country, is you always hear people, especially being it's crazy being here at Jim Hill. I always hear somebody say, you know, I want my kids to go D1 when Jackson State, JSU is right around the corner and they're a D1 school, and then you'll mention that to them, they like, man, not really, man. You know, and it's like, well, they're D1. Can you explain the difference to me between D1, D1AA, and D2?
SPEAKER_00:Right. So that D1 separation really only comes in football, right? So it's the football, the FBS, that's the football bowl uh subdivision, and then they have the FCS, that's the football championship subdivision, right? So if you're in the FBS, those are the teams that can play for the national championship that you see on New Year's Day and all of the above, right? The FCF has its own national championship where you go to a playoff system, which they actually run through like North Dakota has been winning for years and years and years, right? But that's what the FCS, that's the difference between the two. That's the only sport that it has, right? Because basketball, Jackson State goes to the tournament win a swag championship. You know, it's the only sport that that matters in is in football. So if your child is not competing in football, then it don't matter across the board. Period. Gotcha. You know what I mean? Because when we go to our national championship, when my teammate won the national championship, he beat LSU, he beat O Miss, Mississippi State, you name it. I don't care who it is, they lined up against them, they lost. Right? So at the end of the day, it only truly matters in football as far as the difference between division one, right? So that's the only thing. Now, division two is obviously another that's another thing, you know. That's a whole nother division and division three, and the scholarships kind of vary depending on what division you're in.
SPEAKER_03:Okay, cool, cool, cool. Uh, why why do you think there is the FBS and FCS?
SPEAKER_00:Well, look, man, you're gonna give me. I always debate this, right? I'm gonna tell you.
SPEAKER_02:We're doing the fifth.
SPEAKER_00:No, no, no, no. I'm gonna give I'm gonna give my comment on it. I think the true division is just has to deal with economic status, period. Gotcha, right? At the end of the day, they want to keep the money with the money, right? They don't want to spread the money out. See, because when you have to have more teams come in, because see what's gonna happen, and and Coach Prime has already got this in the works, right? When you give the talent, the people are going to follow. Right? That's all it is. At one point in time, all the talent was in the swag. Period. And the hall of fame shows that proof, okay? Right. All the talent was in the swag. All of a sudden, Alabama, Ole Miss, LSU say, hey, we need some of these African Americans to come over here, and all of a sudden the power switch. Right? And that's all it is at the end of the day. It's about talent level and facilities. Gotcha. We get the talent to come back to the HBCUs, the facilities are gonna come with it. Because the money is gonna come. Because people are gonna come to the games, they're gonna watch. TV's going to come, right? Right. Just watch. In a minute, you'll see Jackson State making those moves, and all of a sudden, people are gonna be like, wait, what's going on? That's all it is. It's all about economic status at the end of the day.
SPEAKER_03:Okay, all right, cool, cool, cool. Well, hey, I appreciate y'all getting on with me. Uh, I've been wanting to do this interview with y'all since last March. It's a pleasure.
SPEAKER_05:Okay, don't put us out there like that. It was me.
SPEAKER_03:Yeah, I was mainly talking to you.
SPEAKER_05:I know you're talking, mate. I'll accept that.
SPEAKER_03:But thank y'all so much. Uh, and also, you know, I gotta give my flowers before uh, you know, always gotta give flowers to people while they're alive. Coach Harris, uh Tamika, I appreciate all the hard work you do with me at Jim Hill. You make my job so much easier at Jim Hill.
SPEAKER_05:Well, thank you. It's it's really been a pleasure coaching with you. So we we built a nice uh system and a program. So it's great when you can build a program.
SPEAKER_03:True, true, true. And last thing, shout out y'all uh social media before y'all get out of here.
SPEAKER_05:Okay, so our Instagram is at We Work Hard M S. Come on, Junior. Junior wants me to shout out his Instagram. His Instagram is the J Man Show. T H T E J A Y Man Show. Please like and subscribe his YouTube channel. It is uh what is it, J fam?
SPEAKER_01:I believe it's JMH Fam.
SPEAKER_05:JMH Fam on YouTube. We also have a fully functional website, www.wework, come on, son. www.weworkhardms.com. You can get these nice shirts, and we have some new products launching in the spring. Right now, you can get these shirts, they come in use size. We have some racerback tanks. Uh, we did a survey not too long ago. So a lot of the items that you all asked for, they're coming in the spring. So we work hard ms on Instagram, www.weworkhardms.com is the website. And follow him on uh at the J Man Show. What's your TikTok son?
SPEAKER_01:J Man619.
SPEAKER_05:J Man619. Please go follow him on all social media platforms YouTube, TikTok, and Instagram. Go ahead.
SPEAKER_03:All right, y'all. I appreciate it. This has been another episode of For the Health Of it, and I'm your host, Corian KPAPage. Thank you for watching.