On the 20th day of March in the beautiful scenery of the National Stadium in Warsaw, the conference “ Volleyball School Centers – goals and objectives in 2013” was held.
The conference was honored by the presence of the following distinguished guests: Mrs. Joanna Mucha Minister of Sport and Tourism, Mr. Mirosław Przedpełski – President of the Polish Volleyball Federation, Mr. Waldemar Wspaniały – Project Manager, Mr. Zbigniew Krzyżanowski – Head of Training in the project and the Headmasters of the 127 schools participating in the envision.
I am delighted to meet so many illustrious persons - the President of the Polish Volleyball Federation Mr. Przedpełski began - This is a very happy day for me. I dreamed about this project for a long time. I would like to say thank you to all of the people involved in this program. Special gratitude I address to the Mrs. Minister Mucha. Without the assistance of the Ministry of Sport and Tourism we could not have dreamed of starting this program. Now I can say with clear conscience - we managed.
The project is treated as a pilot case for the other disciplines. With this initiative we want to pull youth away from computers and interest them in physical activity. Volleyball in Poland is on the very high level, National Teams are successful and this is the reason why young people feel attracted to this sport. I would like to wish all of us fruitful continuation of this project and would like to see National Team consisted of students, from schools being part of the program, as gold medalists during Olympic Games in 2024.
- I am glad we can meet especially in the National Stadium- said Minister of Sport and Tourism, Mrs. Joanna Mucha – This is the first such program ever and the start is already a success. I would like to congratulate to all these people who put their contribution to it. I realize that it was not easy but I hope other Federations will follow the Polish Volleyball Federation’s footsteps. She underlined that the most important matter is recruitment to schools and the monitoring of the whole process, rather than successes young people can reach now. The key is to achieve goals in the future. She asked for balanced training schedule taking into account long-range goals. She declared help in the further implementation of the program and complimented program and the people involved once again.
I am very happy to hear all these warm words related to our program – Mr. Wspaniały, Project Manager - said. I am very proud we managed to gather very creative and full of passion group of people to invent and develop this program. Not only were we able to help clubs by appointing Volleyball School Centers but to issue many teaching materials as well. Most of the 6 books forming one set that was sent to all the teachers and coaches were proudly written by polish coaches. I must also mention we created web platform (www.mlodziezowasiatkowska.pl ) where we put over 200 minutes of debriefing films. This program is a long lasting project. The patience is the most needful to behold effects of our work. He said he was very grateful to the headmasters for their involvement in developing the idea.
During the conference the documentary film about the Volleyball School Centers was displayed as well as attendees discussed matters related to cooperation between the Polish Volleyball Federation and schools participating in the project.
The Volleyball School Centers’ project is a common initiative of the Ministry of Sport and Tourism and the Polish Volleyball Federation. The program was started on the 1st of September 2012 in 127 schools in Poland – 32 upper secondary schools and 95 secondary schools with cooperation of 207 teachers.
The most significant part of this project was to appoint 32 mens’ and womens’ Volleyball School Centers in each voivodeship. Each Volleyball Center consists of 3 secondary schools and 1 upper secondary school. 3035 young players in both genders were totally included into the coaching system.
Interestingly, the research shows that 52% of the participants constitute girls. Most of all (1645 children) are from the first class of secondary schools. From all voivodeships the most significant participation is in Slaski Voivodeship (312).
Within the framework of the project, each Volleyball School Center was supplied with modern training equipment, as well as with salaries for the coaching personnel and competition system between schools qualified to the project.
In each voivodeship a coordinator was appointed, who supervises the project in particular province.
To facilitate the work of teachers and coordinators, the special web platform was created (www.mlodziezowasiatkowka.pl). Thanks to this platform each teacher is able to follow the consolidated coaching system and exchange experiences.
The plans and concepts of training for each age-group are available on the web platform for a teachers and coaches, as well as teaching aids, including books authorship of the best polish and foreign coaches.
The Volleyball School Centers’ program is the first project of nationwide circulation, is a part of growth strategy of sport, through moving financial resources from competitive sport to general sport, increase the number of trainings at schools or to popularize the general sport by existing sport infrastructure.
Special value of this project constitutes a combination of dissemination and equalization of opportunities, both teachers and young volleyball players.