SOME 30 children, aged six to 14, benefited from a one-day volleyball clinic in Trelawny on Friday as Jamaica Volleyball Association (JaVA) capitalised on the International Volleyball Federation (FIVB) Cool Volleyball Campaign.

With the Cool Volley Campaign aimed at helping national federations attract young people to the sport, JaVA worked in partnership with American charity organisation, Mystic Rhoads Production (MRP), to stage the clinic at Falmouth All-Age School with children representing several primary level schools in the parish.

Under the guidance of coaches Steve Davis and Demarr Pinnock, JaVA provided technical assistance to the participants with CEO of MRP, Adam Rhoads, and six other volunteers of the charity organisation chipping in.

Being introduced to volleyball for the first time, the children "caught on very quickly", said coach Davis.

"Jamaican children are very athletic and intelligent. They only need good instructions and they will apply themselves," he added.

Clinics like these, through the Cool Volleyball Campaign, would help JaVA strengthen the budding primary and prep school programme, which would have its second staging next year.

JaVA president Major Warrenton Dixon, meanwhile, stressed the importance of developing volleyball from the "grass roots".

"If we are serious about competing at the highest level we cannot allow ourselves to be constrained by our financial limitations.

"We must find innovative ways to forge ahead, while continuing to seek better outcomes from our sponsorship requests. The development of our volleyball is too important for us to sit and wait for better luck," Major Dixon insisted.

The charity organisation, MRP, holds an annual "Spike It Up" beach volleyball tournament in Trelawny and has as its mission to "improve the world at the community level through education, healthy lifestyle, and environmental conservation efforts".

After the clinic, MRP donated two net systems and four balls to Falmouth All- Age School and one net to JaVA. Participating children also received T-shirts and other tokens.

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