Play It Smart is a program designed to partner Academic Coaches with at-risk athletes. The Academic Coach works as a professional educator to help the students excel and advocate for themselves. The game plan is to help student-athletes take responsibility for their futures through lessons learned in sports, in the classroom and in service to others.

Play It Smart builds on the positive peer pressure of the team and its participant's interest in sports. The program's academic coaches are trained in a set of guiding principles and a variety of tactics, which are designed to make academic achievement the norm. Working closely with the direct support a team's head coach and others in the community, Academic Coaches hold one-on-one goal setting meetings, career and life skills sessions, mandatory study halls, SAT/ACT prep classes, community service projects and other team building events.