JAMAICAN students will, starting this August, have the option of doing a bachelor of science degree in sport sciences at the University of Technology.

The four-year programme is being offered on the heels of the island’s success at the 2008 Beijing Olympics and last year’s World Championships in Berlin.

It is to be offered by the new Caribbean School of Sports Sciences — a division of the newly formed Faculty of Science and Sports at the university. Students doing the degree can opt to do a major in Sports Management, the Art and Science of Coaching, or Sports Athletic Training.

UTech already has a reputation for turning out world-class athletes, including the Brigitte Foster-Hylton, Asafa Powell, Shelly-Ann Fraser, Melaine Walker, Sherone Simpson, Germaine Mason, and Shericka Williams — who have succeeded under the tutelage of head coach Stephen Francis and his brother Paul of the MVP Track and Field Club.

Head of the School of Sports Sciences and UTech’s adjunct professor, Dr Neville Graham, told Career & Education that the decision to develop the new sports science programme was born of both a need and an experience.

He used the decline of West Indies cricket as an example of why it is important that the current quality of Jamaica’s athletics and netball not be allowed to suffer the same fate.

“We need to develop a sustainable level of quality for our sportsmen and women to allow them to be world beaters on a continuous level. We want to get our cricketers back on top, our footballers back on top… all the other areas and where we weren’t on top we want to get it there and so the training of professionals to come to the fore and UTech is well poised for that,” he said. “We recognised that it is needed in Jamaica (and) our school will specifically address the sports professional… In Jamaica, we need at least 300 well-trained sports professionals per year in those three areas,” Graham added.

Former head of sports at UTech, Olympian Dennis Johnson, noted that sports athletic training will churn out experts in sports physiotherapy and conditioning, who are complete athlete health caregivers. According to him, too many of the stars of Boys’ Championships in years gone by had been lost to injury.

“We’re trying to prevent that and at the same time create jobs for people in sports who like that discipline, and they need to know that it exists,” Johnson said.

The programme will have both theoretical and practical components with modules in Sports Law, Anatomy and Physiology, Basic Spanish, Psychology, Sports Journalism, Sports Tourism, Sports Marketing, and Doping in Sports.

An essential part of that will involve sport electives where students will get advanced training in golf, football, track and field, swimming, advanced swimming, basketball, volleyball, gymnastics, squash, badminton, netball, and hockey.

“In that way, coaches would be able to manage and become specialised in a specific sport,” Graham said.

There will also be sports coaching courses. UTech is already partnering with some local sporting associations, including the Jamaica Football Federation, to offer these training seminars.

Students will also do internships, which Graham said is critical.

“That is so important because the student will not only understand what is necessary scientifically but also what is out there practically. So when you finish your degree, sometimes you will have a job already and that is how we will ensure the student will finish with a skill and be able to connect with the needs of the community,” he told Career & Education.

Existing students of the university pursuing different majors will also be able to take modules offered in the programme. And at a later date, Graham said, working professionals in the field of sport who wish to do a certificate or other types of programmes offered by the school will also be able to do so.