meet our team

Jonah Silk is an experienced soccer coach who earned his Master’s in Social Work at the University of Michigan in 2020, specializing in clinical mental health work. He has coached and mentored many successful and many struggling athletes. Growing up, he was a multi-sport athlete who had to overcome many setbacks. His story is a part of Goals and Glory as well, and it allows him to relate well to and help young athletes.

During the summer after his senior year of high school, he suffered a complete fracture of his lower leg while playing at a recruit camp at Brown University. His tibia and fibula broke in four places, and he had two surgeries to repair his leg by inserting and screwing a titanium rod into his tibia. After a 7-month rehabilitation and relearning to walk and run, Jonah recovered and returned to soccer. He had many other previous injuries and was forced to sit out many times from the sports he loved. Returning to those sports helped him overcome the trauma that he experienced and taught him the power of sport and how to help others dealing with their own difficult setbacks. Jonah also used his love for sports to make it through instances of Antisemitism, and saw the ability of sports to unite people regardless of race, religion, or class.

Jonah had been a leading scorer in both soccer and hockey in high school in the New Haven, Connecticut, area, but he decided to pursue soccer in college. After a long rehabilitation, he played at Drew University, where he earned his Bachelor of Arts degree in Political Science with a minor in Holocaust and Jewish Studies, in 2010. Jonah led Drew in scoring in 2009, collecting a Conference Offensive Player of the Week award that October. He truly felt the impact of setting goals, scoring goals, and recovering from setbacks to find glory. From his personal experience and witnessing other athletes suffer through their own challenges, the idea of Goals and Glory developed. Jonah believed he had found his calling: to help struggling athletes overcome obstacles and reach their dreams.

Since college, Jonah has coached at the highest level of youth club soccer at the Player Development Academy (PDA), high school varsity soccer, and with the Division 1 program at Rutgers University. He has won a state championship with Oak Knoll High School in Summit, New Jersey, and earned the New Jersey Union County Coach of the Year honors in 2014. He won a state championship at the club level as well with the Under - 12 PDA Wolves, a team he coached from under 8 years old until Under -13 years of age. Most importantly, he has helped send many players to college to achieve their goals as scholar athletes.

Jonah is now coaching the women's club soccer team at the University of Michigan. He also coaches individuals' athletic performance through his own private practice.