June 3, 2010
Scholar of Scandinavian diplomacy is also a serious soccer coach
Christine Ingebritsen is a keen scholar of Scandinavian diplomacy, committed enough that’s she’s written books about it.
In UW classrooms, Ingebritsen focuses as if she and her students are navigating a fjord into an ocean.
As a soccer coach, Ingebritsen focuses similarly. She’s polite but absolutely determined to quickly get where she and her players need to go.
A player herself since the age of 10, Ingebritsen has coached teams for both boys and girls. Her Villa Academy boys team led two divisions in total victories during 2008 and 2009, and Vikings United, her Recreation League team, competed against kids a year older this past season and led its division.
At a February match at Magnuson Arena, Ingebritsen’s girls, third-graders, lined up in front of her. She leaned toward them in blue jeans, a black windbreaker and red clogs.
“The kids are going out onto the field,” she’d later recall. “I look each one in the eye — Kate, Anna, Regina — and say this is the position you will play. You are in control of that part of the field, and nobody gets by you.”
She sometimes adds: “Coach is hungry. Coach needs a goal. I need you to put something in the bucket for me. Can you do that? Look me in the eye. Can you put something in the bucket for me?”
And the player nearly always says yes. Yes, I’ll do it. Ingebritsen taps him or her on the shoulder as if bestowing knighthood. Often as her players take the field, they rub a Viking statue for luck.
Several years ago, one of Ingebritsen’s players had never scored a goal. “I could see that Chase was really, really trying,” Ingebritsen said, “so I said Chase, if you get a goal, Coach will take you out for an ice cream.”
Minutes later he did, so Ingebritsen dashed onto the field. “I picked him up like he’s a rock star. I said, ‘Chase, two words: ice cream!'”
Most of the time, dads coach soccer teams, which is fun for Ingebritsen. Before matches, they watch her arrange orange cones that define field boundaries. “I think they figure, hey, we’ve got a mom out there. Isn’t that sweet. She probably doesn’t know a lot about the game, so we’ve got this match in the bag.”
Whereupon her kids whomp the other team.
Sometimes after Ingebritsen’s team scores a goal, all five players on the field zip back to “Coach” for high fives. Opposing coaches sometimes stare, but no matter.
“Christine is a great collaborator. I think our styles complement well,” said Matt McIlwain, a partner with Madrona Venture Group who coaches the Villa team, 11-year-old boys, with Ingebritsen. “She’s really capable of motivating and inspiring the boys to stay focused and build skills. I probably do a little more running the drills day in, day out.”
“For me with my kids,” Ingebritsen said, “it’s almost like the Olympic games. “My husband will tell you that on game days, I’m not somebody he can approach or speak to. On the sidelines, I prefer not to talk with parents because I’m so focused on the lineups, what’s happening in the play, on what configuration of team members is going to deliver.”
“Christine teaches the girls about competition and at the same time about good sportsmanship,” said Danielle Safka, mother of 9-year-old Kate Safka. “She can command their attention so practices are really well run.”
A native of Reston, Va., 48-year-old Ingebritsen graduated from William Smith College in Geneva, New York. She played varsity soccer for four years and was team captain her senior year. In the last 30 years, William Smith has appeared 20 times in the NCAA women’s soccer tournament.
At the UW, Ingebritsen’s course repertoire includes Politics in Scandinavia, an upper-division class. She came to a February class in the same red clogs as those at the soccer match but teamed them with a serious black pants suit.
On a whiteboard, Ingebritsen wrote a class outline that included four student research presentations.
She then took a seat on the sidelines, focusing pale blue eyes on the speakers. One student talked about ecology and corporate attitudes in Norway. Ingebritsen then questioned him and suggested additional research: ecologically unfriendly production of aluminum. She also reminded the student and the rest of the class that the country is known for ethical diplomacy and brokering solutions to big problems. “Norway,” she said, “is punching bigger than its size.”
After class, senior Naomi Hubert, who’d had a heavy cold, stopped to talk.
“How are you feeling?” Ingebritsen asked.
“I’m doing better today,” Hubert said, but clearly, she still had the cold.
“Listen,” Ingebritsen said, “Do this for me. Call the health center and stop by.”
Hubert nodded OK.
Outside a few minutes later, Hubert said she likes Ingebritsen. “She’s a fantastic teacher. Very intense, but she doesn’t just lecture. She mixes theory with her own experience. And you can’t come to class unprepared, because she calls on people.”
Former students sometimes send Ingebritsen photos of themselves with soccer balls.
Teaching is wonderful, she acknowledged, but results — particularly in the case of graduate students — often take years. A soccer match produces results a whole lot faster.
But there’s tension between desire and ability. If a soccer player runs out of gas, Ingebritsen pulls him or her from play. It means some kids get more time on the field than others.
Somewhat the same thing happens in class. It’s hard, Ingebritsen said, when a student wants to succeed at the highest level but either can’t or needs significantly more attention.
So coaches deal with it and learn along the way.
“It wasn’t until I started coaching that I realized how much I got back,” Ingebritsen said. When I started teaching, I realized the same thing.”
