Open and clear commitments and communications. The BMS Project avoids secrecy and advances information that increases the likelihood that all related persons and organizations, such as coaches, parents, athletic leagues, and other, will have the necessary information to make informed ethical, legal, and youth-serving decisions.

Instead of achieving business and organizational success, doing the right thing, insofar as the staff of the BMS Project can determine what the right thing is, will always be the most important marker of success. Doing the right thing stands on the values to which the BMS Project is committed. These values are described, below.

The BMS Project will refuse to participate in or condone activities that hold potential for harm to athletes or others or that otherwise my violate normative ethical standards of health care professionals or health care organizations.  The BMS Project commits to service as an ethical standard, placing a subordinate value on its interests and a superordinate value on the welfare of those who need and use its services.

Along with the values described below, the ethical commitments already defined guide the best intentions, decisions, and actions of the BMS Project. They are published here to encourage all of our affiliates to integrate these values into their decision making and actions.  The BMS Project concludes that the ethics and values describe here hold relevance to it staff, parents, coaches, and others, while recognizing that each individual will adapt them to specific circumstances.  The BMS Project believes that its openness about it ethics and values will serve as an invitation for others to share its mission. The ethics and values give a picture of its grounding in its commitment to the welfare of athletes and everyone else who aspires to enhance the well-being of athletes.

Inherent in the ethical commitments already described, several values describe the aspirations of the BMS Project. Among them,

THE NEEDS OF ATHLETES COME FIRST: Clearly, the BMS Project joins with parents and coaches, along with others, to form a team and to share our collective and individual efforts toward meeting the needs of athletes of all ages. Thus, even when athletes are not directly involved in our activities, such as educational sessions for parents and coaches, every decision is made in the best interest of each athlete.

GENEROSITY: The view of the BMS Project is that we will make others’ lives better, because of what we give them. This includes the website and all of its materials, but also the services that the staff and associates voluntarily provide.

HEALTH: Health is better than sickness. This is to say that the BMS Project wishes to advance the cause of health in its operations, seek to share its information about health, and help others to move toward achieving their best experience of health.

DISCIPLINE: The BMS Project brings every good intention to enjoy life and to carry its inevitable burdens in ways that affirm life, but it brings discipline, too. And, insofar as it can focus its discipline, the BMS Project will do its best to ensure that others benefit from its relationships with them.

ENJOYMENT: All of us know that life brings burdens—worries, disappointments, crises, and much more—but we know, too, that life is for living and that this means living in ways that evoke laughter, hugs, pleasure, fulfillment, and many other positive and life- affirming moments. The BMS Project promotes enjoyment, including the enjoyment of physical health, team relationships, and athletic competition.

INTEGRITY: As flawed as human beings are, very little of what we do or aspire to do may be characterized by absolute integrity. Nevertheless, believing that we should aspire to come as close to absolute integrity as we are able, the BMS Project chooses to hold this value as tightly as we are able and to fulfill it in its operations.

RESOURCEFULNESS: The premium resource of the BMS Project is each individual who shares its mission. They seek to prize one another. And, while they may not personally know everyone who may come into contact with the BMS Project, all of them are positively valued. Expanding this way of valuing, the BMS Project believes that it should cautiously risk placing its aspirations before you and invite you to collaborate with the BMS Project staff in making the BMS Project a shared resource and in creating new resources.

POSITIVE AND LASTING RESULTS: The BMS Project recognizes that parents and coaches, along with others, have enormous influence on the development and future of athletes of all ages. Therefore, we seek to interact with parents, coaches, and, of course, athletes in ways that likely result in positive and long term results.

CONSTANT IMPROVEMENT: The staff of the BMS Project—all volunteers and donors—understand that its work is always evolving toward improved effectiveness. Thus, it welcomes feedback from parents, coaches, athletes, and others who share the BMS Project mission.

Ethics and values guide the decisions of the BMS Project. Published codes of ethics may be easily located in an Internet search. All major healthcare associations publish their codes of ethics.

Values, too, guide decisions. Virtually all of us recognize that our personal values guide many of our decisions, even when we do not self-consciously remind ourselves about what these values are. Without reminding ourselves, we recognize that personally held values, such as loyalty, humility, honesty, kindness, compassion, integrity, family, freedom, and others, enable us to live well, knowing that we have enhanced our self-regard and elevated the importance of others. This is what the BMS Project aspires to do.

As the BMS Project aspires to elevate the importance of others, with special attention given to young athletes, their parents and coaches, the BMS Project recognizes that it relates with individuals from different backgrounds, ages and varied interests. With this in mind, the BMS Project welcomes everyone who shares its mission and commits to honor differences, while sharing a common interest. Together, all of us can be a force for good.