We need a culture shift in relation to school sports

Dear Editor,

A student-athlete is defined as an enrolled student who participates in an organized competitive sport sponsored by the college/university in which he or she is enrolled. Student-athletes must balance the roles of being both a student and an athlete at their school. Many student-athletes are subject to eligibility rules to maintain a certain GPA in order to continue participating in their sport. As the NCAA puts it, “Student-athletes must, therefore, be students first.”

In Guyana, quite a large percentage of our student population are gifted athletes (across multiple disciplines), but may not necessarily meet the requirement or get the help that is needed to perform and succeed as bona-fide student athletes.

The question is how are we educating and helping our young people to find and pursue their natural pathway to achievement and ultimately success as student-athletes?

Too many of our best, gifted junior national athletes, across disciplines have fallen by the wayside and have not gone on to experience greater academic and athletic success, not because of lack of giftedness or effort, but because they did not get the right guidance.

Our system and culture of education/sports have a lot to do with this. Hence, there has to be systematic and cultural reform in education that addresses sports in school and student athletes, not as a cover for competition purposes that are largely self-serving, but rather for edification and development of the student and the larger society. The ideal outcome ought to be the formation of the ideal student who is equipped and enabled to go on to greater levels of success.

At Marian Academy, for example, it is our policy that student-athletes making a competitive school team maintain 85 per cent at primary level and 70 per cent and above at secondary level in their overall academic averages. We also regularly affirm and honour those student athletes who achieve success. Marian, a few years ago, introduced a Sports and Co-curricular Honour Board, which has been given the same prominence as all the other Honour Boards that are displayed in our school hall. In addition, at our Prize-Giving there is the coveted Scholar Athlete Award, which has served to motivate our students (male and female) toward athletic and academic excellence.

I am often blown away when a new student is enrolled at Marian Academy who had no prior exposure to sport and extra-curricular activity at their previous school. Yet at Marian, we are able to maintain an excellent academic record, promote social and religious consciousness, and still prioritise and administer 34 sports and co-curricular clubs. Physical Education and Sports are a priority from nursery through to CSEC, which demonstrates that education and sports can be integrated as a whole.

We have to move beyond rhetoric and provide proper education and guidance to our student athletes.

Statistics have shown that a college degree has a direct impact on a person’s quality of life. We have to encourage and give help to those student-athletes who have the aptitude and interest in pursuing sports as a pathway.

The advantages of competing in college sports are both immediate and lifelong. There are many benefits that are derived from student-athletes playing their chosen sport while pursuing higher learning. We have to encourage more youth to pursue this viable pathway.

The introduction of a CAPE PE and Sports programme provides an ideal opportunity for us to undertake a course of reengineering the school sports landscape in Guyana. Innovatively implementing this latest

programme could have a significant and positive impact on the lives of scores of young people, and ultimately enhance the society at large.

I personally think that it is a national embarrassment that we have not seriously taken to the task of enabling more of our best talents to pursue a college and university level education as student athletes. Through this means we can expose them to the many opportunities available through sports, with the possibility of moving on to professional careers in sport in all of its various fields. Something is seriously wrong with this practice which manifests gross neglect and under achievement. I know that we celebrate the occasional international acclaimed achievement of our national athletes and teams who do well. But after all of the excitement, have we stopped to give thought to our nursery and systems of development?

I would like to suggest that those who are planning to implement the CAPE PE and Sports programme give some thought to the following:

  1. The CAPE programme should be offered to student-athletes with a high athletic aptitude and right attitude for academic learning. These individuals would have the best chance of pursuing further education as a student-athlete at the college and university levels.
  2. We should begin to identify those persons meeting this requirement from as early as Grade 8 (Form 2) and then help them in developing the discipline and focus toward athletic specialization and academic discipline. By Grade 9 (Form 3) student athletes looking to gain scholarships should already be on a serious programme and pathway toward meeting NCAA and other institutional criteria.
  3. We need to plan our CAPE PE and Sports programme with a five-year cycle in mind. This would give a student-athlete five years of focused preparation for that potential scholarship.
  4. Parents, students and faculty must be educated and must buy in to this process, so that they in turn can be guided in making the best decision for our children’s future.

We need a culture shift in Guyana when it comes to school sports, one that would allow us to help our young people to maximise their potential.

I hope we can do it!

 Yours faithfully,

Chris Bowman

Sports and Co-curricular

Coordinator

Marian Academy