More sports officials exposed to child protection issues

Twenty-two persons, mainly physical education teachers, persons attached to the Division of Physical Education and Sports and other persons engaged in sports, were last week Thursday involved in a workshop aimed at sensitizing them to the issues associated with child protection.

The one-day workshop was an undertaking of the St Vincent and the Grenadines Cricket Association Inc, in collaboration with Cricket West Indies.

Using the UNICEF/ Child Protection module, the workshop facilitators were Sandra Augustus and Denise Harold of the Ministry of National Mobilization and Ian Allen, Territorial Development officer for cricket here in St Vincent and the Grenadines and the Windward Islands.

Nelson Hillocks, director of Sports and Physical Education, implored the participants to make us of the knowledge obtained at the workshop.

“You must implement what you have learnt…. We must start the revolution in child protection and we have a responsibility to try to correct this in this country…. The lone goal must be to protect every single child, and no child should be left behind; so, we have to start the revolution to protect every child participating in sports,” Hillocks stressed.

“By dropping the baton, we will be failing our children and nation; all children must be protected from incompetent coaches who don’t have the skills to take the child beyond the basics, but there are some qualities in them to fool us and this is affecting sports; so, we really have to deal with them”, the director of Sports and Physical Education added forcefully.

As a follow-up, the St Vincent and the Grenadines Cricket Association Inc is expected to hold another such workshop in 2018. (RT)