I can speak from the student's perspective.
Here's my background: I've been driving since the Cal Games offseason of 2010. I've studied great drivers (Nick Lawrence, to name one), and great coaches (Karthik, Paul Copioli, JVN, Adam Freeman, etc.). I thought I knew how to coach, and to this day, I still do.
HOWEVER, knowing something is one thing, executing it is another. At the Cal Games 2011 competition, I was both a driver, and the coach (never at the same time). Looking back, I was a HORRIBLE coach. I'm not saying this as a generalization to all student coaches, but I was bad. I gave bad directions, didn't comprehend what was happening at times, and didn't have the maturity or driver respect to pull off a strategy.
When I drive, I'm fine. I can drive with or without a coach, but as I learned at the Silicon Valley Regional last weekend, I do so much better with a coach. An adult coach. I ensured this season that we have an adult behind the glass, and IMO it's one of the best driving decisions the team has ever made.
There are so many reasons why I now prefer adult coaches, I can't list them all. Does it take away from the student's experience? No! If anything, as a driver I felt as if I performed the best I ever had. Sure, a student could have been down there coaching, but we wouldn't have been nearly as successful as we had with our adult coach.
I'm not saying one is right or one is wrong. Like everyone else is saying, "it's what's best for your team". And while I can't speak for everybody, a good majority of teams prefer an adult coach, and for a reason.
If you would like more information on my experiences with an adult coach, and why I chose to have one over a student, feel free to PM me.
And please, someone post a link to all the other threads like this, and then close this one. It's going nowhere, like the others.
