Olympic Sports Academy Programme Concept Note

A concept note I developed whilst working at Sports For Social Change Network as a sport project coordinator was a idea about developing a sports academy school which was embedded in the sporting activities of the Olympic Games. The school which would start with a bottom up approach for having first a primary school with learners graduating into each grade as the school continued to grow.

The school would be built on a farm and would follow the Cambridge International Examinations IGCSE and AS/A level syllabus or the IB International baccalaureate programme as this would allow the learners easy access into prestigious institutions of higher learning globally at a later stage. The unique selling point of this school is that the sporting programme it offers is aligned to Olympic sports and the students take up multi sports from a young age and filter into specialization only at High school. The multi sports academy would offer sports on site such as archery, fencing, handball, futsal, football, basketball, tennis, beach soccer, volleyball, table tennis, badminton, aquatic sports and outdoor and adventure activities and track and field.

The learners would also be taught about Olympism and the Olympic values education. They would be trained from a young age in a multi sports programme.  In the off season the academy would be used as a training camp site for summer camps and international training camps for overseas national sports federations looking to train their athletes at a reduced cost.

This programme would be one of a kind in South Africa, as there is currently no programme that offers a comprehensive sport experience of this kind. Imagine the possibilities of if such programme existed. We would align it with the National Sports Olympic Confederation of South Africa SASCOC and also position it as a base camp for talented learners for both Olympic Games preparation and the Paralympic Games. Learners would grow up being physically literate in a number of sporting activities and the talent pool potential would only increase for Olympic representation. The learners would grow up with the ethos of stronger, faster, higher - together.

By Sithembiso Nkosi