Word By Jenny Yun-Chen Chang/ Taiwan
Photo By Danny Wang/ Taiwan
Kaohsiung- Most coaches have children, even if they don’t, all the players on the team are like kids to them. Wen-Pin “Allen” Liao, the head coach of New Taipei Municipal Taishan Senior High School (TSSH), has much more experience of raising children than other coaches his age because he himself has four kids and he started coaching at a rather early age.
Even though Allen is still a “young” coach who’s only 31 years old now, back to “his time” in senior high, everyone prioritized National Taiwan Normal University (NTNU) since once you graduate from NTNU, it’s a guarantee that you can be a teacher.
“I didn’t determine to be a teacher at the time,” Allen said, “but everyone wants to enter that school. Good players did, good students did, and so did I. I started to realize that I might not be able to play for a long time, so I started to walk on the path of teaching.”
On the way becoming a teacher, Allen learnt to play the other two roles: A father and a husband. It wasn’t easy to take care of his family and school work at the same time, but he still made it.
“Thanks to my family’s help and support.” Allen said, “They’re always supportive throughout my college life. They support my dream and my purpose, and this helps me understand my personal goals in different stages of life very clearly.”
Graduated from TSSH himself, Allen became an intern teacher at TSSH during his senior year and has never left since then. TSSH has always been his home, and the smaller age difference between Allen and his players helps their relationship as well.
“I always treat them as if I’m an older brother to them.” Allen said, “You can say that I became a father earlier than most people my age, but to be honest, I still don’t have much experience, so I’d say, just an older brother guiding them.”
Back to the time when Allen was still a senior high school student, there’s no cellphones, but it’s something teenagers can’t live without nowadays. Being a millennial himself, Allen has his own theory regarding to whether to give students one-hundred percent control and trust on using cellphones or not.
“You never know whether they will play better if you give them some time to relax,” Allen said, “but the key is always discipline, and I think this is also something they need to learn at high school. They need to balance their life, and try to learn from discipline.”
To Allen, it’s never about getting the championship or losing games. More important is that students truly know when to do what, and truly value the process instead of the outcome. Yet because he thinks process is more important than the result, he feels sorry for his family.
“Actually I believe many coaches face the same problem.” Allen said, “I can’t accompany my family as much as many others do. As a coach, I always accompany others’ children more than my own kids.”
No matter it’s basketball games or recitals, as long as the events take place at a time that Allen is available, he’ll try his best to be present, and he even participates in Parent’s Association.
“I want to be part of their childhood,” Allen said, “but their school work during workdays have to depend on their mother, so I’ll spare myself for them as much as possible. Also, I don’t intervene what they want to do. I only tell them to never give up once you choose the way.”
With four children, two boys and two girls, which means “double good” in Mandarin character, Allen said there are pros and cons to have so many kids within one house.
“You know,” Allen said, “the good part is that it’s always noisy, yes, that’s good, but of course when there are many people at home, it’s easy to lose patience. That’s something I need to learn, especially when two of my kids get to the point which I need to listen to them carefully.”
Allen’s eldest daughter is about to enter senior high, eldest son is about to enter junior high, and the other two children are still toddlers. They’re all at different stages that are needy and require accompanying very much.
Not only need to spend time with his players for greater accomplishment at the tournament, but also have more responsibility to his family, Wen-Pin Liao hopes that he can excel every aspect of daily life in the upcoming year.