Youth League Research Articles

Coaches attitudes about returning to play in youth and varsity sports post- COVID-19

BACKGROUND: One industry affected by the COVID-19 mandated social distancing policies is sport. In the wake of pressures to return to some normalcy, sport leagues have begun a return to play, many of which include regulations additional to the typical athlete and fan experience. Youth, Middle School, and High School sport leagues are of specific interest in America given the currently inconclusive national plan for returning to face-to-face instruction of students at schools. PURPOSE: The current goal is to identify the perceptions and experiences of current sport professionals throughout the country regarding a return to play. METHODS: The participants of this study were 181 Youth and High School Sport Coaches of various sports. The sample contained males (n = 123) and females (n = 58). The age of respondents ranged from 20 or more years of age. A return to play questionnaire was created and used to collect data for this study. The survey consisted of 12 yes or no questions regarding a return to play during the pandemic, with an opportunity for an open-ended explanation for each. Statistical methods employed to conduct data analysis included frequencies to determine percentages. A crosstabs analysis and Pearson Chi-Square tests of association were utilized to identify statistical significance within the variables. FINDING: No statistically significant association was found at the p ≤ .05 level between age or years of coaching experience and any response to a yes/no question. Percentages for high school coaches who responded "Yes" to each question are presented. Due to the wide variety of responses in these open-ended explanations, statistical expressions were not conducted, and an inclusive list of explanations for each question is provided. CONCLUSION: While the research result is unclear, the information obtained from coaches in the current study presents a small illustration of the current perceptions of athletic leaders in this region regarding the return to play of youth sport coaches and their respective schools' policies.

When positive energy meets satirical feminist backfire: Hashtag activism during the COVID-19 outbreak in China

Amid the eruption of the COVID-19 outbreak in February 2020, the Chinese Communist Party Youth League promoted VTubers on Weibo to diffuse positive energy. However, the female VTuber Jiangshanjiao was appropriated immediately as political satire by netizens to air public grievances. While political satire is widely considered as political resistance in authoritarian states, little research has addressed its combination with feminist narratives and online activism. This article builds on previous literature on the propagandistic nature of positive energy and the Chinese feminist movement to consider how positive energy lying under Jiangshanjiao was deconstructed and how femininity was invoked to serve for broader political purposes in a repressive online environment. Drawing on the framework of online connective action and political satire as a networked practice, this research sheds light on the hashtag #JiangshanjiaoDoYouGetYourPeriod#. This research explores how the satirical hashtag was collectively produced in an Internet trolling culture and contributed to building a collective identity through personalized narratives. Through the feminist hashtag, netizens expressed their multilayered grievances against misogyny, state propaganda, and censorship. However, this article also offers evidence that the satirical hashtag and ambiguity associated with it limited the influence in catalyzing online and offline changes.

Research on Climate Adaptation Design Strategy Driven by Spatial Performance from the Perspective of Land-Based Rationalism: Taking the Academic Complex Project in Central School of Communist Youth League of China as an Example

With the rapid urban development, the construction of public buildings in China has been greatly promoted, and the problem of large energy consumption of public buildings has also become increasingly prominent, with a stronger demand for close combination of public buildings and passive design. Based on the characteristics of theater space, this paper mainly studies the passive design method of large space, excellently integrates climate adaptability design technology with passive building design strategy, and explores the optimal passive design scheme for theater buildings, by taking the academic complex project in Central School of Communist Youth League of China as an example, with passive priority and active optimization for the principle from the aspects of climate adaptation and indoor environment comfort.

The Afrikaner reaction to the singing of liberation songs in South Africa: The case of Julius Malema’s ‘Dubul’ ibhunu’ (Kill the Boer, Kill the Farmer) song

The article traces the impact and relevance of the singing of the liberation songs by members of the African National Congress (ANC) and the African National Congress Youth League (ANCYL) in South Africa’s new and fragile democratic dispensation. The study also highlights the reaction of the Afrikaner section of South Africa’s population, which claims that the singing of liberation songs, particularly ‘Dubul’ ibhunu’ promotes racism and hatred. Essentially, this challenge to the song by the Afrikaners was triggered by the singing of it in public by the then ANCYL President Julius Malema. The failure by Malema to refrain from singing this song led to taking the matter to the courts in order to ascertain the relevance of such songs in a democratic South Africa.

РУССКО-КУБИНСКИЙ ИНТЕРНАЦИОНАЛИСТ – ЗАЩИТНИК ИСПАНСКОЙ РЕСПУБЛИКИ: МОИСЕЙ РАЙГОРОДСКИЙ

More than a thousand Cubans fought in favor of the Spanish Republic. Some of them were people born in the Iberian Peninsula, settled in Cuba a long time ago and before the outbreak of the civil war, they launched themselves to the defense of the legally established government. But there is a very interesting example that reflects how solidarity has no borders or impediments: the case of Moisés Raigorodsky. A young Russian who lived in Havana since he was a child and had participated in the struggles against the dictator Gerardo Machado, showing great courage despite his young age. For this reason he was very persecuted by the police forces and the Communist Youth League, to which he belonged, organized his departure from the country to Spain in 1935. Months later, Moisés did not hesitate to join the Fifth Regiment to defend the Republic from the attack of the Falangist hosts and died heroically in the battle of Casa de Campo, in November 1936.

Compliance with State Concussion Legislation in Non-School-Affiliated Youth Sport Leagues

ABSTRACT Youth league administrators (N = 172) documented knowledge of/compliance with state concussion legislation, and were assigned to groups based on whether their state concussion legislation extended to non-school-affiliated (NSA) youth sport leagues: EXTEND (50.6%) or NOT EXTEND (49.4%). Administrators within the EXTEND group were 2.7x more likely to report having a formal concussion policy. Only 90.7% confirmed a policy for removing concussed athletes from play, and 75% required independent medical clearance, and 82% mandated education for coaches, 49.1% for parents, and 35.9% for athletes. These results raise questions regarding compliance with state concussion legislation, especially for NSA youth sports leagues.

Exploration on the Construction and Innovative Practice of the Vigorous Youth League Branch in Colleges and Universities

The youth league branch in colleges and universities is an important unit of the league organization. It is the most direct contact team for the league members and young students in colleges and universities. It undertakes the basic work of the league organization and shoulders the important task of correctly guiding the youth league members' thoughts and actions. In the face of the influence of multi-cultural in the Internet age, the ideological consciousness of some contemporary youth league members has gradually deviated from the weak, the working ability of the youth league branch needs to be improved, and the work responsibilities of the youth league branch also show the trend of marginalization. These problems are highlighted, and the work of non university youth league branches poses higher challenges. This paper explores the innovative practice of the youth league branch in colleges and universities, hoping to enhance the vitality and cohesion of the youth league branch in colleges and universities by enhancing the organizational consciousness of the league members, strengthening the training, exchange and the functions of the college youth league branch, and enriching the work form, as well as comprehensively implementing the management system, and strictly implementing the reward and punishment measures.

Xi Jinping's Important Exposition on Youth Work: Scientific Connotation, Value Meaning and Practical Path

General Secretary Xi Jinping issues an important statement on youth education, which lays the main tone, expounds the general ideas, and clarifies the general goals for the party's youth work in the new era. The scientific connotation of this important argument is embodied in the specific requirements for young people's values, beliefs, moral quality, diligence, practice, innovation and entrepreneurship. The value meaning is reflected in the role of attaching great importance to the status of youth, which deeply reveals the direction of youth becoming talents, caring for the development of youth and carefully planning the mission of youth in the future. To grasp the future practice path of my country's youth work, we must highlight the role of the Communist Youth League as a bridge and link as an important starting point. That grasping the fundamental direction, clarifying responsibilities and missions, clarifying paths and methods, deploying reform plans and implementing strict governance of the regiment can unite, cohere and cultivate young people for the party. In this way, the party's youth mass foundation will be continuously consolidated and the broad masses of young people will always be the party's loyal assistants and reserve forces.

The Associations Between Physical Performance and Anthropometric Characteristics in Obese and Non-obese Schoolchild Handball Players.

This study investigated the relationship of body fat and fitness measures in schoolchild handball players. Twenty-eight young male handball players from handball first youth league volunteered for the present investigation (age: 10.9 ± 0.72 years; body mass: 54.8 ± 22.9 kg; height: 1.48 ± 0.10 m; body fat: 27.6 ± 9.23%). Measures included the Yo-Yo Intermittent Recovery Test level 1 (Yo-Yo IR1), jumping ability [squat and counter-movement jumps (SJ, CMJ)], and sprint tests (10 m, 15 m). Anthropometry was assessed by body mass, body mass index (BMI), and fat percentage (%BF). The power of the upper limb was measured as the total distance thrown overhead using a 2 kg medicine ball. Intrarater reliability for all parameters showed a coefficient of variation (CV) below 10% and an intraclass correlation coefficient (ICC) above 0.75. All ICC were excellent (ICC ≥ 0.96). Reliability as shown by the CV differed between 1.0 (sprint 15 m) and 5.6 (sprint 10 m). With the exception of medicine ball throw, we found significant differences between non-obese and obese in all performance parameters. The differences ranged from ηp2 = 0.47 (sprint 10 m) to ηp2 = 0.09 (medicine ball throw). The two-step-linear regression analysis using the predictors body height and body weight (step 1) and body fat (step 2) showed a marked increase of explained variance by adding body fat. The largest r2 changes were calculated for sprint 10 m (0.54), CMJ (0.49), and sprint 15 m (0.42). The lowest influence of the predictors was observed for medicine ball throw (step 1: r2 = 0.03, step 2: r2 = 0.07). With the exception of sprint parameters (β-coefficient sprint 10 m: -0.74; β-coefficient sprint 20: -0.66), a decrease of %BF leads to a higher performance in all parameters. %BF in youth handball players should be an important concern for practitioners working in this team sport in contrast to the frequently used BMI. It seems sensible and appropriate to engage very young children in physical activities such as team handball in order to improve their physical fitness. Decrease in% body fat could be considered both as a training and nutritional target to enhance and optimize sport performance-related outcomes.

Centralism, localities and leadership: the politics of the Chinese Socialist Youth League in the early 1920s*

Abstract This article investigates a dramatic change in the leadership of the Chinese Socialist Youth League in early 1924, following a series of ideological and emotional rivalries between young radicals. It explores how the stepping down of Liu Renjing leader of the Youth League reflected the limits of Moscow’s policy in China, as well as the fragility of both Bolshevik iron discipline and the Leninist organizational norms applied by early Chinese communist leaders. The article further argues that the dynamic intersection between emotions and political rationales ultimately influenced how global communism was localized in China in the early 1920s.

"Not Just Tea Drinking": The Red Teahouse and the Soviet State Public in Interwar Uzbekistan

"Not Just Tea Drinking"The Red Teahouse and the Soviet State Public in Interwar Uzbekistan Claire Roosien (bio) In April 1928, speaking at the Third Convention of Uzbekistan's Communist Youth League (Komsomol), a young activist registered a serious critique of the Red Teahouse. Red Teahouses were the foremost institution for Marxist-Leninist instruction in Uzbekistan.1 By all accounts, Red Teahouses enjoyed a great deal of popularity, in part because ordinary, "black" teahouses had already been a fixture of Central Asian social life for centuries. But the activist complained that in some Red Teahouses, Uzbekistan's youth were not studying the books that had been sent to them for political education. Instead, the books had been hung from the ceiling with ropes—dusty, torn, and unread.2 To be sure, he added, some Komsomol activists had managed to attract popular participation through other entertainments: he specifically mentioned donkey races and competitions among players of the dutar, a local stringed [End Page 479] instrument. But if teahouses were to become properly Soviet, they needed both to remain popular and to align themselves with party agendas. There is no way of knowing why those communist books ended up on ropes rather than on shelves—or, even better, in the hands of readers. Perhaps teahouse administrators felt the books would be better appreciated as decorations than as reading material. Perhaps, as Komsomol activists complained elsewhere, the books' pages were being used as wrappings for food, and hanging them from the ceiling kept the pages close at hand for patrons in need of a napkin.3 Whatever the reason, the dangling Marxist-Leninist tracts represent the central problem the Bolsheviks faced in creating state-sponsored mass institutions in Uzbekistan. On the one hand, the institutions functioned to assert state control: to promulgate Marxism-Leninism and, more importantly, to mobilize Uzbekistan's masses for collectivization and the cotton monoculture. On the other hand, mobilizing the masses required creating an institution that was truly popular: one that would get Central Asians in the door voluntarily and facilitate enthusiastic participation in state projects. The challenge facing Central Asian activists was to take advantage of the teahouse's popularity while also making the teahouse Red. In this article, I examine the institution of the Red Teahouse in the early Soviet period. Red Teahouses mushroomed in Uzbekistan's countryside especially during the years of the first two five-year plans, totaling more than 3,000 by 1934.4 I take seriously Soviet activists' claim that the Red Teahouse existed [End Page 480] to promote mass participation even as they sought to exert state control. I term this space for popular participation the "state public," foregrounding at once its comparability to the public spheres of interwar Western Europe in an age of mass politics, and the Soviet state's unprecedented aspirations to control. But by promoting participation, the Red Teahouse created the conditions of possibility for forms of public life that the state could neither predict nor control. In particular, the Red Teahouse provided harbor for modes of teahouse sociability that had roots in pre-Soviet practices. Sometimes, these off-label uses of the Red Teahouse supported state agendas; other times, they undermined those agendas. To make this dynamic clear, I begin with a discussion of teahouse culture before the Soviet period. I then proceed to examine the adoption of the Red Teahouse model in the Soviet period, the changing expectations for how Red Teahouses would function during the five-year plans, and the ways that popular participation both facilitated and undermined those expectations. In the conclusion, I pan out to a broadly comparative view, suggesting that the Red Teahouse should be considered neither a communist nor a Central Asian aberration but rather a case study of the tensions inherent in modern projects of mass publicity around the world.5 In examining the Red Teahouse as a Soviet institution, I draw on two main source bases. First, reports housed in the Russian State Archive of Sociopolitical History (RGASPI) and the Uzbekistan National State Archive (O'zMDA) offer the perspective of the primarily Russian-speaking administrators who supervised the construction and functioning of Red Teahouses. Archival sources provide indispensable statistical...

Research on the Structural Design of Academic Report Complex Building in a University

This project is the construction project of the academic report comprehensive building of the Central Youth League School. The main function of the project is the academic report room, including an 800-person lecture hall, a 300-person multi-function lecture hall, a 500-person multi-function lecture hall, an exhibition hall, etc., and three underground floors. There are three floors above the ground, and one floor is partially high. There are 12.8, 13.8, 15.7, 18.2, 18.6, 20.8, 27.8 meters in the sub-regions of the roof structure elevation. This article introduces the structural system, the judgment of structural out-of-limit situations, prestress design, steel truss design, suspension steel structure design, cantilevered large-span concrete beams, etc., through a variety of structural calculation and analysis methods, and find out structural weaknesses, and adopt Corresponding seismic strengthening measures, the calculation results show that the structure has good seismic performance and can meet the requirements of the code.

The World Youth Festival as a Soviet Cultural Product during the Cold War

This article discusses Soviet cultural diplomacy from the perspective of cultural production. It analyses a Soviet-sponsored international event, the World Festival of Youth and Students, as a cultural product created within the socialist system. The first festival was held in Prague in 1947, and the tradition continued throughout the Cold War period until today. Earlier scholarship has examined the festival as a propaganda tool, a forum for cross-cultural encounters, and a battlefield of the cultural Cold War between the capitalist West and the socialist East. Much has been written about individual world youth festivals and national delegations, while the design, cultural background and fundamental ideas behind the event have been much less acknowledged. By employing the concept of mega-event and comparing the festival with iconic international events, such as World’s Fairs and the Olympic Games, it discusses the festival’s composition and evolution, its reception, and how the event found its place in a world shaped by the tensions between the two social systems. It employs materials from the main organiser of the event, the World Federation of Democratic Youth, documents from the Communist Youth League (Komsomol) and the Communist Party of the USSR, and contemporary newspapers and magazines. The author argues that the USSR developed an attractive global cultural institution, which well suited the Cold War environment but was too dependent on financial support from the socialist bloc and too tied to the political agenda of the Soviet Union to become a universally accepted institution.

Scheduling Multiple Sports Leagues with Travel Distance Fairness: An Application to Argentinean Youth Football

The first division clubs in Argentinean professional football maintain teams in each of six youth leagues, classed by age as major divisions (Under-20, Under-18, Under-17) and minor divisions (Under-16, Under-15, Under-14). Regular season play in these leagues typically follows a single round-robin format; the minor divisions play the same schedule as the majors but with the home-away status of the matches reversed. This setup can give rise to very significant differences in travel distances between the major and minor division teams of a given club, which is a frustrating situation for club officials, coaches, and players alike but almost impossible to avoid with manual season scheduling techniques. Nor are these methods able to take into account any number of other criteria that go into the design of a satisfactory match calendar. This paper reports on models developed using mathematical programming to simultaneously schedule multiple leagues while also meeting a series of other desirable conditions. The central criterion is a better balance in the travel distances of the various teams, pursued through the application of two alternative solution approaches: one based on regional team clusters and the other on explicit analysis of actual distances between the teams’ home venues. The solutions generated by these approaches have been used by the organizers of the Argentinean youth leagues to draw up their season schedules since 2018, which has resulted in a series of benefits for all stakeholders.

Psychosocial intervention models and outcomes after a terror disaster.

On July 22, 2011, a car bomb blast in the government quarter in Oslo killed 8, injured 209 of the 350 employees who were at work, and destroyed 1700 of the 3500 work places in the ministries. Shortly afterward, the terrorist killed 69 adolescents and young adults and injured another 110 of the 495 survivors at a summer camp on an island outside Oslo, organized by the Youth League of the ruling Labor Party. The paper describes the two disaster models that were applied in providing the preventive and therapeutic psychosocial interventions: the company/organization model for the governmental employees and a combined community and organization model for the victims of the massacre and their families. Some of the findings from the longitudinal research and outreach programs that were conducted are reported.

Social Capital and Self-Rated Health: Empirical Evidence from China.

This study assesses the relationship between social capital and self-reported health (SRH) by comparing different genders and ages. It utilizes data from the 2016 China Family Panel Study data with a sample of 30,657 adult individuals from 25 provincial-level administrative regions in China. This was a cross-sectional study conducted with computer-assisted face-to-face interviews to assess social capital and self-rated health among Chinese adults. A multi-level Poisson regression model is employed to model social capital-related dependent variables using the independent variable of fair/poor health status. In terms of social relations, mobile phone use can improve men’s health. However, this effect is insignificant for women. Moreover, gender and age interact with the relationship between social capital and individual health. The relationship between trust and self-rated health is not significantly different between men and women. The frequency of feeling lonely and the lack of feelings for the community in which they live have a negative impact on self-rated health, but there are no obvious differences in terms of gender. The number of meals per week with family members is negatively correlated with men’s SRH, but there is no correlation with adult women 41 and above. Lack of help from neighbors is negatively correlated with men’s health, but not with that of adult women 40 and below. Being a member of the Chinese Communist Party or a member of the Chinese Communist Youth League is positively correlated with SRH for women 60 and above.

Does competition standard and player position influence the match-play physical demands of Australian elite youth male soccer players within a single squad?

The purpose of this study was to investigate the influence of competition standard and player position on the physical demands of Australian elite youth male soccer players during match-play. Twenty-three elite youth male soccer players from the same Australian U17 National Centre of Excellence program were observed across 8 National Youth League (NYL) and 21 National Premier League (NPL) competition matches. Total (TD/min), low- (< 3.6 m/s), moderate- (3.6–5.0m/s) and high-speed (> 5.0 m/s) running distance, and the accelerations (Acc/min) (≥ 2.0 m/s2) and decelerations (Dec/min) (≤ −2.0 m/s2) were recorded using 15-Hz portable global positioning system tracking devices (GPSports, Canberra, Australia). An interaction was observed between competition standard and player position for TD/min ( p = 0.003), HSRD/min ( p = 0.007) and Acc/min ( p = 0.037) indicating the influence that competition standard had on these variables varied according to player position. Furthermore, we report that Central Defenders (3.1%), External Attackers (4.2%) and Central Attackers (3.8%) performed more TD/min in NYL (professional development level) compared to NPL (semi-professional) match-play. Central Defenders (24.2%) and Central Attackers (17.0%) completed more HSRD/min in NYL (professional development level) compared to NPL (semi-professional) match-play. Central Defenders (47.8%), External Defenders (20.5%), Midfielders (18.5%) and External Attackers (32.3%) all performed more Acc/min in NPL (semi-professional) when compared to NYL (professional development level) match-play. The results of this study provide scientific basis to aid the match-preparation of Australian elite youth male soccer player’s transition to higher standards of soccer.

Research on the Effectiveness of the Construction of Ideological and Moral Education for Rural Minors Based on Big Data Analysis

The ideological and moral construction of minors more targeted and effective has become an important issue. To this end, the Youth League Committee of our district conducted research on this topic by holding a symposium on the work of ideological and moral construction of minors, visiting party and government leaders of relevant departments, studying and exchanging in the districts and counties, combining with computer big data technology to conduct research on this subject. At the same time, the paper also expounds the positive role that the Communist Youth League should play in the ideological and moral construction of minors.

104. At-risk tackling techniques in American football

BACKGROUND CONTEXT In American football, fewer fatalities and severe injuries have been seen annually since 1976, when rules were enacted to prohibit certain types of aggressive tackling. The National Football Head and Neck Injury Registry was established in 1975 and data from 1971-1975 were retrospectively reviewed to better understand the mechanisms involved in catastrophic cervical spine injury. PURPOSE This study was an assessment of (1) tackling techniques coaches were teaching at 3 levels: youth (4th–5th grades), middle (6th–8th grades), and high school (9th–12th grades); (2) tackling techniques used during games; and (3) successful tackle rates of these techniques. STUDY DESIGN/SETTING Descriptive epidemiology study. PATIENT SAMPLE Not applicable. OUTCOME MEASURES Not applicable. METHODS This study received IRB approval. Surveys were distributed via email to 500 coaches of football teams in Texas. Coaches provided video recordings of football games with players from youth league (YL), middle school (MS), and high school (HS). All tackle attempts were graded by one reviewer who watched game videos; 1000 consecutive tackles were observed for each group. Survey data included how coaches instructed their players to tackle, the types of tackles, the number of tackles vs missed tackles, the head position, and the initial contact. Data were analyzed using the chi-square test. A subset of 100 consecutive tackles at each level of play were reviewed by two blinded reviewers to assess intra- and interrater reliabilities using Cohen's Kappa calculations. RESULTS (1) In all groups, coaches instructed players to use the “head across the bow” tackling technique: 83%, YL; 81%, MS; 75%, HS. Coaches instructed players to “keep your head up” 89%, in the YL; 100%, MS; and 81%, in HS. (2, 3) During games, players used head-up, inside shoulder tackles more successfully across all groups: 97.5%, YL; 99.5%, MS; 98.8%, HS. While intra- and interrater reliabilities were in the good reliability range, these scores were lower in the youth group. CONCLUSIONS Our study supports the effectiveness of tackling with the head up and with making the initial contact with the inside shoulder. Lower reliability ratings for the youth group were likely due to lower video quality and lack of players’ tackling experience. FDA DEVICE/DRUG STATUS This abstract does not discuss or include any applicable devices or drugs.

Reliability and Validity of Maximal Mean and Critical Speed and Metabolic Power in Australian Youth Soccer Players.

The reliability and validity of maximal mean speed (MMS), maximal mean metabolic power (MMPmet), critical speed (CS) and critical metabolic power (CPmet) were examined throughout the 2016-2017 soccer National Youth League competitions. Global positioning system (GPS) data were collected from 20 sub-elite soccer players during a battery of maximal running tests and four home matches. A symmetric moving average algorithm was applied to the instantaneous velocity data using specific time windows (1, 5, 10, 60, 300 and 600 s) and peak values were identified. Additionally, CS and CP¬met values calculated from match data were compared to CS and CPmet values determined from previously validated field tests to assess the validity of match values. Intra-class correlation (one-way random absolute agreement) scores ranged from 0.577 to 0.902 for speed, and from 0.701 to 0.863 for metabolic power values. Coefficients of variation (CV) ranged from good to moderate for speed (4-6%) and metabolic power (4-8%). Only CS and CPmet values were significantly correlated (r = 0.842; 0.700) and not statistically different (p = 0.066; 0.271) to values obtained in a shuttle-running critical test. While the present findings identified match-derived MMS, MMPmet, CS and CPmet to be reliable, only CS and CPmet derived from match play were validated to a CS field test that required changes in speed and direction rather than continuous running. This suggests that both maximal mean and critical speed and metabolic power analyses could be alternatives to absolute distance and speed in the assessment of match running performance during competitive matches.