Tina Syer (@tinasyer4) is the former President at Positive Coaching Alliance. Syer played Division I field hockey at Stanford University, where she graduated with honors and was named an Academic All-America. Her coaching experience includes seasons at the high school, college and Olympic Development levels.

Here, Syer explains strategies she used to create a caring climate on her youth team. According to Syer, Mary Fry's research on a caring climate places incredible importance on the first practice with new players and new families. Using Fry's research, Syer made sure to establish a philosophy that was centered around improvement and fun. She also conducted a team building scrimmage between parents and players to improve the sense of family and community throughout the team. The scrimmage made parents realize the difficulty of the sport and was a unique way to build camaraderie and have teammates and parents get to know each other.