Dale Long is entering his ninth year as an athletic director and is still having fun.

Long was announced as the North Callaway activities director in March after football head coach Kevin O’Neal decided to step away to focus on his duties as a head coach and as the high school’s assistant principal. Long was an athletic director at Butler, Southern Boone and Owensville prior to North Callaway.

The Oak Park graduate Long — who has degrees from William Jewell College, American Public University and Northwest Missouri State University — has 16 years of experience as a head coach and has coached football, wrestling, softball, baseball and basketball at Archie, Owensville and Butler. He said has been acclimating to his new home since June.

“My family and I are really excited to be here,” Long said. “I’ve got two boys — one’s a senior and the other one’s going to be a sophomore — and they’re excited to be here. My wife is going to be working for the North Callaway district as well. I’m happy to be around great people and a district that wants to improve and be the best district around this area.”

Long said he has already helped out wherever he can at practices and wants to make sure early every program’s needs are met. After coaching various sports, he said he sees their perspective and has ideas how he as an athletic director can assist them. 

While Long hasn’t spent much time in the district yet, he said he has a good idea what North Callaway is about.

“It’s a great community,” Long said. “It’s very supportive. You’ve got a lot of people wanting to make it better. A lot of people at the school are willing to put in a lot of extra work and time to try and get their programs better. We’ve got a lot of community support. I met with the booster club and other people in the community, and they seem pretty gung-ho about wanting to keep everything moving in the right direction and having a lot of success.”

Long said he will be dedicated to having good organization and communication in his post because those are some of the most important qualities of being an athletic director. He said sufficiently understanding goals of each program along with what they need any given day is part of that communication and being organized is helpful with so many programs and events every year.

After holding positions at other schools, Long said having that experience has consistently been beneficial but philosophy has changed. He said his philosophy now boils down to hard work while also having fun.

“A lot of it is working hard and grinding it out but having fun while we’re doing it,” Long said. “If I’m not having fun and enjoying it, then nobody is having fun and enjoying it. I try to make sure that I’m enjoying the process and seeing it through.”

Long’s goals for the athletic department align with what he enjoys about being an athletic director. He said supporting the coaches is important but so is becoming more familiar with the kids.

Long said building relationships by “sitting down with kids and coaches” is a key to success. He said figuring out how to achieve people’s personal goals add up to team and district goals.

“Getting to know the kids and what their goals are and what they want to accomplish, not only in school but (seeing) what we can do to help them after they graduate,” Long said. “We want to build leaders and kids that want to be successful and feel accomplished in what they want to do. How can we get the most out of our kids and most out of our coaches in order to sow success here and being the best little district around the Columbia area.”

Long said he is more familiar with North Callaway’s football and wrestling program because those are the sports has been around the most. He is aware of and excited for more success in other sports. 

The football team is coming off an 8-2 season and wrestling had its second state champion in as many years. The softball team is trending upward after its first 20-win season in seven seasons and baseball is doing the same with its first 20-win season in 12 seasons and second straight district title. Golf had its first all-state golfer just a year ago as well.

“You’ve got kids that are gritty,” Long said. “They’re willing to work to be successful. Being able to see that from the outside, especially when I was at Southern Boone, I was able to learn more about them.”