After spending eight years as one of Coronado High School’s most successful coaches, Aaron Brooks will be taking a behind-the-scenes role in the school’s athletic department.
Brooks, who began working in Coronado in 2015 as a special education teacher and as the Islander boys varsity soccer coach, is following Robin Nixon’s 15-year tenure in the position.
As part of his new job, Brooks will be in charge of over 20 sports teams after compiling a stellar 84-31 record, making the CIF playoffs at Division 1 or higher all seven years and earning three league titles.
Working behind the scenes
Yet, Brooks said his work now boils down to “doing the behind the scenes support for coaches and athletes.”
As a coach and lifetime athlete, Brooks said his experiences have positioned him to understand the kinds of support that coaches and athletes need.
The past eight years in Coronado gave him a sense of the“heartbeat of the culture of what Coronado was looking for,” he said.
Brooks, who also spent three years teaching in Riverside and Palm Springs, has come to learn that Coronado’s community is an active one.
“They like to be involved. They like to support people. They like to get out,” he says. He looks forward to further “intertwining the high school athletics with the community itself.”
Summer adventure
But, before he officially takes on all the duties of his new job, Brooks will be adventuring this summer.
Sports and traveling are probably two of the things that really kind of make me tick in life,”
-New Coronado High School Athletic Director Aaron Brooks.
“Sports and traveling are probably two of the things that really kind of make me tick in life,” he says.
In July, he’s taking a cross-country journey in his customized van that he tricked out with a kitchen, shower, bed, small bookcase, bench and luxury seats during the the pandemic.
Brooks said he will be camping with his family of educators in Yosemite National Park, as his mother, brother, sister, and brother-in-law are all teachers.
After that, he is heading to South America for three weeks with stops in Peru, Argentina, Brazil and Columbia.
When he couldn’t travel internationally because of the pandemic, Brooks said he spent those summers trekking through at least 22 states while visiting a dozen national parks with his poodle, Parker.
Connecting with people
Brooks, who has a Bachelor of Arts in Communications from San Francisco State University and a Master’s in Education from National University, said he loves to connect with people and places all over the world.
And, he believes that sports unlocks the ability to do so.
“There’s just so many neat opportunities through all types of sports to be able to connect with anybody no matter where they’re from,” says Brooks.
