Athletic Director Eve Claar discusses the culture of excellence at Pioneer
Ann Arbor Pioneer High School is celebrating another remarkable season, with three women’s teams claiming state championships in field hockey, cross country, and swimming & diving.
For Pioneer Athletic Director Eve Claar, the success reflects something deeper than talent alone.
“Those three programs are historically very strong,” Claar says, crediting the leadership of head coaches Jane Nixon (field hockey), Nancy Boudreau, and Stefanie Kerska (swimming & diving). All three of them have strong visions for their program and do a great job at culture building. Their team culture carries over year to year with new coaches, students, and parents flowing into the culture year to year.”
A legacy of excellence
The numbers tell a compelling story. Nixon, who began as an assistant at Pioneer in 1990 and became head coach in 1999, has led the field hockey team to 17 state titles. This year’s championship marked the program’s 31st overall state title, cementing Pioneer’s dominance in the sport’s inaugural MHSAA era.
Kerska, an all-American swimmer while at Pioneer High School, was hired in 2014-15 to coach both boys and girls swimming, and has compiled an extraordinary record in just over a decade. She has won four state titles and one runner-up finish with the boys in 12 seasons, while leading the girls to six consecutive state championships and one runner-up finish in 11 years.
Boudreau, in her 11th year coaching both cross country and track and field, has built a dynasty of her own. In cross-country, she has won four state titles and three runner-up finishes, with all 11 seasons resulting in top-10 state finishes.
This year’s championship was particularly historic, as the Pioneer girls not only captured the state title, but sophomore Natasza Dudek is in the process of capturing national titles one after another.
More than Xs and Os
For Claar, what sets these coaches apart goes beyond technical expertise.
“All three of them do it for the right reasons, meaning they’re trying to develop young people into better adults through sports,” she says. “If you’re in it for those reasons, then you’re going to have success, no matter what.”
She emphasizes that while not every coach inherits a championship-caliber roster, success can be measured in different ways. She’s proud of each team at Pioneer.
“Every coach doesn’t have a state championship level team that shows up at practice every day, and that’s okay,” she says, “but you can always have success if you’re in it trying to create better people.”
Still, all three coaches bring elite technical knowledge to their programs.
“All three of them are very high-level technicians, tacticians,” Claar notes. “They really can teach their sport at very high levels. They understand the highest level of strategy and training and all of the things that come with it.”
Building a pipeline
A key element of Pioneer’s sustained success is Claar’s deliberate approach to developing future coaches, particularly women.
“I think we do a really good job of finding great female coaches, great female leaders, for our women’s sports programs,” she says. “I do make concerted efforts to build really strong applicant pools that bring in female applicants to every pool.”
Claar’s strategy involves identifying promising young coaches early—often former Pioneer athletes—and providing them with mentorship opportunities.
“We try to identify them as athletes when they leave here. Often they’ll come back and volunteer or start to work with us, and we can develop them into great coaches, future coaches.”
Even when interviewing for head coaching positions, Claar brings in candidates she believes have potential, even if they’re not yet ready for the top job.
“I always try to bring them into an interview room,” she says.” I want to give them the experience, and I want to try and see if I’m right and that they’re a good fit, that I want to try and bring them in and give them an opportunity to coach under somebody else’s leadership.”
This approach helps prevent burnout.
“I think when you do it too early, and you set somebody up that’s not ready, especially in a place as big as this, they drop out of the profession,” Claar says, comparing it to young officials who face intense pressure before they’ve developed resilience.
Community support and high participation
Pioneer’s athletic participation numbers are exceptional. With approximately 1,000 student-athletes competing across 35-36 sports annually (with more women’s sports to provide equal participation opportunities), the school benefits from strong community support and deep youth programs.
“All three of them have strong community support for those programs in terms of students participating at a young age,” Claar says.
The school’s booster organization reinforces this support, with last year’s Booster Bash raising $65,000 for all teams. Students are drawn to these programs not just for potential championships, but for the experience itself, she says.
“You get excited when any student joins it because you know that there are great benefits for them, individually,” Claar says. “I think it really accelerates the growth of kids. In sports, that growth can be very much accelerated. They’re put in positions very regularly where they have to face adversity, overcome things, and you can see that growth happening kind of before your eyes.”
With six consecutive state titles, Kerska’s swimming program operates under intense expectations. But Claar views this as applying to all programs equally.
“There’s an expectation of all of our programs that you’re going to get the very most out of who you have,” she says.
Looking ahead
How does Pioneer sustain this level of excellence? For Claar, it comes down to support and community building.
“I think we just continue to support the heck out of coaches,” she says. “You make people feel valued and feel a part of something and feel supported. We have some women’s coaches groups that we facilitate, and I think it helps to create a community here, where our women coaches help develop other strong women coaches.”
After 24 years as an athletic director, Claar remains energized by the coaches around her.
“I am blessed to have coaches around me that motivate me to be the very best that I can be for them,” she says. “They’re amazing to be around. I learn something from them every day. There’s a level of magic, I think, that each of them has in connecting with their teams, elevating their teams, and pushing the right buttons to motivate.”
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