Seaforth High School announced on May 15 that Jared Worley will take over as the school’s new athletic director starting June 15.
A Pittsboro native and a 2015 Northwood graduate, Worley will step in for sitting AD Jason Amy, whose last day at Seaforth will be June 14.
After playing football for the Chargers under former Northwood head coach Bill Hall, Worley played football for four years at UNC as a preferred walk on, and he earned two degrees in sports administration and political science along with a minor in exercise and sport science.
Since graduating in 2018, Worley has spent more than three years as the director of strength and conditioning at Flint Hill High School in Oakton, Virginia, and he spent the past spring at Duke University, working as a sports performance intern.
Worley sat down with the Chatham News & Record Monday to discuss his upcoming tenure as Seaforth’s athletic director and more about himself.
What’s it like to come back to your community, be an athletic director and have an impact on student athletes that have similar experiences as you?
The amount of people that I know here and the support I’ve gotten already after getting the job, it’s been incredible. I’m pumped to be back, I had a sister that went to Chatham Central. My brother’s at Northwood right now. I came up through the Chatham County recreational sports program all the way from Perry Harrison to Pollard to Northwood. To be in a position to help these kids in the high school realm, help their development, help these coaches, help these students and just have the impact that Coach Amy and my coaches like Coach Hall and everyone else had on me, it’s a great opportunity. I’m excited to be here.
How did you come across the opportunity to be Seaforth’s athletic director?
It’s a funny story, actually. So, we bought a house down in Manns Chapel where we’re renovating, doing a couple of things. Me and my wife we were at Lowe’s. As I was coming out, officer Herbie Stubbs was going in, and he was there (as a student resource officer) during my tenure at Northwood. So, we started chatting it up, and I told him what I was doing over at Duke for the spring. He told me about the opportunity and that Amy was going to be stepping down. So, I jumped on the opportunity and I think just like Dalton Brown did, I didn’t wait for the job opening. I put my cover letter, my resume and everything together. I shot it in to Dr. St. Claire and Coach Amy. I called Coach Amy the next day.
You’ve got an extensive background in strength and conditioning. What will you bring from those experiences and hope will help you in your new job?
At Flint Hill, working in the athletic department was a great experience for me. Taking that program right after COVID-19 when everything was shut down, I really got to revamp that program into not only what I wanted, but what we wanted as a department. The first thing I did was communicate with everybody. Like, ‘hey, what was this program like before COVID. What were the opportunities and what not?’ That was with teachers, parents, players and the department. From that communication I was able to create something that accommodated not only football but every other sport there.
How excited are you to take on a young athletic department that’s already had some success and get to know the coaches while also helping them grow their programs?
Coach Amy built a great foundation already. My job is easy. I just build on top of that foundation. So, the standards are set. We’ve seen so much success already with girls’ basketball, the men’s golf team just won a state championship and in track and field, we had a couple of athletes win. So, for us, it’s just continuing to develop these kids. We can’t rely on our past accomplishments. Just because we were there this year doesn’t mean we’re going to be there next year. So, we have to accept the challenge of set standards and high expectations.
Now, you’re a certified bartender and worked as one for some time in Chapel Hill. How did you get into that and do you still make drinks?
That was an odd job as I was looking for my next step after college. After playing, it was, ‘what’s the next step?’ I was all sports all the time for my whole life. So, for me, I knew what I wanted to do, but I wanted to just take a step out and see what the other side of work looks like. I did a bunch of odd jobs. That was a fun time. At night, I bartended at a place I knew in Chapel Hill, and then on the other side during the day, my cousin runs a Christmas Tree farm. So, I worked there during the day, and I’d be smelling like Christmas trees. It was a great time.
