Andre Walker out as Foundation Academy football coach

Foundation Academy football coach Andre Walker will not return to his position next season, the school announced on its social media accounts. 

"Foundation Academy appreciates Coach Walker's time, energy, and effort in leading the football program," said Foundation Athletics Director Robert East. "Change is seldom easy. Ecclesiastes 3:1 may put this in perspective best, 'There is an occasion for everything, and a time for every activity under heaven.' The changing landscape of athletics at the high school level requires schools and programs to be tremendously agile while remaining true to the school's mission. This, at times, can present significant challenges. We are doing our best to meet those challenges and create the best conditions upon which our athletes can grow as young men and women. To be their very best on and off the field. The entire FA family will continue to pray for Coach Walker and his family as new opportunities are presented to him."

Walker understood that after 10 years at Foundation, a change in leadership is reasonable. 

"I think we were on two separate paths," Walker said. "The school wanted leadership to go in a different direction and I thought we had come to a form of compromise, and apparently it wasn't so. To sit here, as I'm talking to you today about not having a job at the school, is somewhat surprising, especially when we think about the way the season turned out. I feel like the things that were asked of me to do, I've done them in a manner that they were asking me to do them in. But I guess it wasn't up to where they wanted the standards to be. Ultimately, they made a decision to part ways with me and as of now, I'm looking for an opportunity elsewhere. ... I want to say I gave (the school) 10 years of hard, consistent labor of doing my responsibilities with no negligence and, you know, 10 years is an awfully long time. Sometimes you ... just need a refresher and I think in this case, that's what kind of happened."

In his four seasons as head coach, Walker had a record of 25-15 and never had a losing season.

"Coach Walker joined the Lions staff under Head Coach Brad Lord in 2014, served as Defensive Coordinator for six years, and helped lead the Lions to a District and Regional title and two State Semi-Finals," the school's post said. "In 2020, Coach Walker took over the program he helped build into one of Central Florida's best football programs. Over the next four years, he won 25 games, one of the highlights being his victory against rival TFA last year. In his 10 years with the program, he helped send 39 players to the next level, some of whom are playing at Power 4 schools such as Oklahoma and South Carolina."