It was just a quick tongue-and-cheek remark. But it was something, that one day, April Roland, 29, hoped would come true.
Last year, during Sobrato High’s most successful year in sports, Roland told then-athletic director Jeff Bernstein that she wanted to take over the A.D. duties once he decided to retire. At the time, Bernstein had a couple more years before that was supposed to happen.
But in May, Bernstein decided to enter into a Master’s degree program, thus cutting off his availability in Sobrato’s athletic department. Unexpectedly, Roland, a San Benito High graduate and two-year Bulldog teacher, was handed the athletic department chair.
“I jokingly asked for the athletic director position and two months later it was no longer a joke,” Roland said. “They told me I should do that.”
Three months later – with the start of classes right around the corner – Roland is getting comfortable in her new position, and she expects big things from Sobrato over the course of the year.
“I felt like I was playing catch-up during the summer, but I feel like I am finally in my groove,” Roland said. “There are a number of challenges. It’s not an easy position. It is time consuming.”
But the athletic director duties are something she believes she is well suited to take on.
“I love being organized and I feel like this is a job that needs to be organized,” she said. “You have to have calendars. You have to have schedules – and that’s me. I always have schedules and I always have to write something on a calendar.”
Beyond that, though, she has a long background in athletics, dating back to her teenage years in Hollister.
As a gymnast and swimmer, Roland studied the sports she was involved with. She admits she wasn’t the most athletic person, but she knows what it takes to be a successful athlete. It’s that knowledge and understanding that shaped her course in college and laid the groundwork for becoming a coach.
“I will be honest and say that I am probably the most unathletic – physically unathletic – person,” she said. “But I can tell you when you’re doing something wrong. I can’t show you the proper way but I can tell you how to do it. I have a lot of coaching experience. I’ve been coaching since I was 16 or 17.”
After graduating from San Benito High in 2001, Roland attended Long Beach State, where she quickly changed her major from English to kinesiology.
“When I went to college I took some swimming classes to stay in shape and I was an English major,” she said. “But then I saw how the P.E. people were so much fun. So I changed my major.”
Roland and her husband moved to Morgan Hill in 2009 when Roland was offered a job to teach physical education at Sobrato. Quickly hoping to get into coaching, Roland coached badminton, junior varsity field hockey and eventually swimming during her first two years at the school.
In her third year starting this fall, Roland plans to only coach swimming as she tries to improve the school’s athletic department, she said. As the A.D., Roland said she aims to focus on the school’s support of its teams, booster relationships and academics.
To Roland, academic success outweighs athletic success.
“We are really on top of getting every student – not just the athletes – to reach their full academic potential,” she said. “With the athletic program, my goal is do just that. I want well rounded student athletes. They are a students first.”
But that’s not an easy task.
“That’s a hard thing for some of these kids,” she said. “They see a lot of NBA and NFL players straight out of high school. And they think they don’t have to go to college … You need to have academics be your backup.”
To assist the student-athlete in reaching academic goals, Roland wants coaches to hold study halls for their players, aiding them in their school work. To do that, she knows she needs to stay in constant contact with the coaches.
“We have some really great coaches that are here,” she said. “So it’s working with those coaches to get the kids to use that practice time not only for athletics but for their outside life. We are instilling commitment and respect on the field and outside the field and outside the classroom. I think for us to continue with this, we have to keep those quality coaches working together. We have to have the coaches working together as a community instead of just by sport.”
And that includes community outreach and school spirit.
“We’ve been talking about trying out some new fundraisers for not only the athletes but the community,” she said. “We are a small community and we should be able to go into town and say, ‘I play at Sobrato and you should support us because our families buy your stuff.’”
And with more support, the school can establish more of an identity, she said.
“One big goal for me here at Sobrato is our school spirit,” she said. “We don’t really see that a lot in our athletic venues. It’s hard for us because we don’t have a stadium, instead we have to play at Live Oak. It doesn’t feel like home for these kids. We want to bring more awareness to the school and where the athletes stand.”
