FPD’s Atkinson accepts GISA service award

Rennie Atkinson is a teacher who coaches.

As the person who came up with the idea of the GISA’s Distinguished Service Award, Atkinson is happy to be on the receiving end.

For 12 years, Atkinson served as executive secretary for GISA Coaches Association. David Bailey, a coach at Stratford, asked Atkinson if he wanted to join the executive staff. That led to Atkinson being nominated, and for the next 11 years, he was voted back into his position.

“It’s been a real rewarding job,” Atkinson said.

He played an instrumental role in growing athletics for schools in the GISA. One of the big things he remembers is his role with the Georgia all-star games.

At first, Atkinson said the games were played between Georgia and South Carolina. Then South Carolina changed their all-star game to just South Carolina players. After trying to partner with Alabama and failing, he said, the coaches decided to just make it for Georgia players and split the teams north and south.

Atkinson is most proud of making the all-star game in 1994 work. Tropical Storm Alberto had swept through the South that year, hitting Florida and making its way up through Georgia, causing flooding and other damage. Atkinson said the game was supposed to be in Americus. With hundreds of coaches and players registered for the all-star game and coaches’ clinic, he thought the eventful weekend would have to be canceled.

Then he started making calls, and with the help of Georgia College, in a few short days Atkinson was able to move the game and clinic to Milledgeville, and almost everyone was able to make it.

“After that week, I was exhausted,” Atkinson said. “I was really proud that those kids got to play in that game. Like so many of the things I did as executive secretary, I wouldn’t have been able to do it without my wife.

“She was on one phone, and I was on the other. Georgia College was really accommodating to help us pull that off.”

What made that moment so special for Atkinson was that he did all of that for the athletes. That’s why he says he is a teacher who coaches and enjoys doing both. If it means helping students better themselves, academically or athletically, he wants to accomplish that.

He cared so much about rewarding the student-athletes who were able to succeed in the classroom and on the field, that he wanted to give them the recognition they deserved.

“I started looking at all these things the kids were accomplishing,” he said. “So we came up with the athletic-academic awards.”

Atkinson said he sat down with Morris Johnson, who was executive director of the GISA at the time, and talked through the criteria for awarding it. The first year, eight students received the award, and 60 students were nominated.

“Teaching and coaching is the most rewarding profession,” he said. “I am so blessed (because) God called me, I wanted to be a teacher all my life.”

This story was originally published July 18, 2016 at 9:42 PM with the headline "FPD’s Atkinson accepts GISA service award."