Two years ago, the Austin-American Statesman asked Texan high schools to go public with the salaries being paid to the men charged with coaching their grid iron teams. After the calculations were done, it emerged the average coach was earning approximately $30,000 a year more than the average teacher. When asked to explain the hefty differential between the two wage scales, some of those involved mentioned that way beyond mere coaching, coaches also played an outsized role in the character development of teenagers.

"I think coaches in general, and not just football coaches, I think they've got a real strong influential power," said D.W. Rutledge, executive director of the Texas High School Coaches' Association. "I believe a coach has two tasks. One is a minor one, and that is really teaching techniques of the game and skills of the game. The major task is the intangibles that coaches bring to the table. Good coaches teach leadership skills and sacrifice and dedication and unselfishness."

That there was no great brouhaha emanating from that investigation perfectly captures the difference between the culture of school sports in America and Ireland. As everybody from the GAA to the teachers' unions contemplate the apocalyptic impact of government spending cuts on school teams, it's interesting to note this is a country where no teacher would ever be expected to run an extra-curricular activity without being paid for it. In these schools, volunteerism is something reserved for the well-intentioned parents of the kids. The professionals must be recompensed for everything they do. Mortgages to pay and all that.

Given that Texan high schools often play their grid iron matches in on-campus stadiums that seat 15,000 people and exist in an environment where coaches have their own weekly radio broadcasts, that state might be an extreme example. However, the spirit of the agreement is the same wherever you go across America. Here on Long Island, the coach of a school soccer team (whose season is scarcely three months long) will get close enough to $8,000. An assistant will receive half that. If those are hardly stratospheric figures, it's a nice enough reward for a part-time job running a couple of training sessions and a match every week between September and November.

These positions are usually offered to and quickly taken up by teachers but if the staffers aren't interested, an outsider will be brought in to the school. Nobody begrudges the people involved. Most observers would argue they deserve more money, especially in towns where overbearing parents stalking the sidelines make coaching a far less attractive proposition. All of this is in marked contrast to the conditions under which generations of Irish teachers have given their time and sanity in the name of growing the games and producing a few half-decent hurlers and footballers.

In an era when teachers have struggled to keep pace with the cost of living in 21st century Ireland, paying them for running school teams could be one way of making the profession more lucrative and attractive. The financial benefits might even go a long way towards ameliorating the crisis regarding the shortage of male newcomers to primary school staff rooms. Of course, that's all pie in the sky in a country where the government instead seems bent on making it more difficult for existing teachers to stay involved in school sport.

Their American counterparts would struggle to understand a situation in which an institution of the calibre of St Kieran's College in Kilkenny or St Patrick's in Navan might have to seriously consider dropping teams once the cutbacks kick in. Over here, the biggest worry facing a school with their success rates would be whether some rival was going to lure their coaching staff away with offers of higher earnings. You see, beyond the stipulated salaries, many high school coaches draw down hefty bonuses from enthusiastic boosters (the American equivalent of rugby alickadoos).

In Seattle, Butch Goncharoff's basic wage for coaching the Bellevue High basketball team is just under $6,000 a year. Having led the school to four state championships since his appointment in 2000, he also pockets a nifty $55,000 annually from supporters of the school (parents and alumni), anxious to acknowledge his achievements. Goncharoff owns a printing business and coaches as a hobby. Nice work if you can get it. Meanwhile in Ireland, principals are contemplating how to circumvent the new substitution rules that are set to play havoc with the way school sports traditionally operate.

Whenever the issue of paying the coaches comes up, those in favour recite the litany of benefits that accrue to the school and the pupils via sport. Independent research shows that kids who play games regularly tend to perform better in the classroom, miss less days each year, and, inevitably, turn out healthier in the long run. Most pertinent of all though is one report claiming students who participated in high school sports were much more likely than non-participants to vote once they turned 18. Something Fianna Fáil and its cohorts might do well to remember.

dhannigan@tribune.ie