THE National Sports Commission (NSC) is in the process of putting together its own database of national athletes to better monitor and offer assistance to national athletes in the varying sporting disciplines.Speaking with Chronicle Sport, Director of Sport Christopher Jones said that the Commission has already begun consultations on how to go about setting up the database and money is being budgeted for the initiative.
“We’re currently in the process of meeting with e-governance for guidance.” Jones said.
A system that will need to include athletes from all 42 varying sporting disciplines that the NSC has listed will be no easy task, and will take a lot of time and resources before it will be up and running. However, Jones noted this database will go a far way in assisting the NSC to help the athletes.
Once the database is set up, Jones said, the NSC would be looking to collaborate with the Ministry of Public Health and the Ministry of Education, to better assist the athletes with amenities such as preferential health care when injured, as well as academic scholarships.
According to Jones, in the not-too-distant future the NSC will be looking to offer scholarships to national athletes, as a means of rewarding athletes who do well. Although the NSC will not rule out scholarships overseas, they are looking to start on the local front.
“We are in talks with the Ministry of Education, hoping that we can offer scholarships to the athletes. Charity starts at home, so essentially we hope to begin at the University of Guyana. In addition there’s a whole host of scholarships that can be had overseas, and we will be scouting for these scholarships as well.” Jones stated.
Once up and running, the database will be kept up-to-date, being constantly updated by the Commission with each new achievement that the athletes make.
This will give the NSC firsthand information on how the athletes are developing and will better enable the organisation to monitor them.
“We’re taking it in stages. First we have to know what we have, and have them constantly updated then we will be able to monitor their progress.” Jones explained.
Jones did not rule out that the database could also be a good source of the athletes’ achievements when making decisions such as selecting them for a National Sports Award.
Once realised, such a database will be the first of its kind known to exist in Guyana.