ISSA backs high-school testing but ...

[Karl]

ISSA backs high-school testing but ...

Published: Sunday | July 28, 2013




Dr Walton Small ... ISSA's president-File






Ryon Jones, Staff Reporter
The Inter-secondary Schools Sports Association (ISSA) is in support of the proposed testing of student-athletes who compete at the annual Boys and Girls' Championships, but is keen on this being preceded by a vigorous education programme for all stakeholders.

"If the Government, through the Jamaica Athletics Administrative Association (JAAA) mandates that selective drug testing be done at ISSA-run championships, then ISSA will have to abide by those mandates," Dr Walton Small, president of ISSA said in an email response on Friday. "Our championships could not proceed without the sanction of the JAAA."

"ISSA would, however, encourage the Government through JADCo, to implement a corresponding educational programme for the various stakeholders."

Small, who is also the principal of Wolmer's Boys, believes that parents of the students to be affected must be consulted every step of the way.

"In addition, ISSA would suggest that a seamless process of parental approval be worked out as this is crucial for the process to work," Small said. "Again, it is imperative that the educational process which has started be intensified so that individuals don't say they did not know."
formalised process

According to a high-level Jamaica Anti-Doping Commission (JADCo) representative, the idea of testing high-school level athletes is not unusual.
"These same athletes are being tested overseas by everybody and they are tested at Gibson Relays, Penn Relays, and Carifta Games," the JADCo official shared. "So, the fact is testing has been going on and we just have to formalise certain things now."

The official went on to point out that it should not be an issue of age, as Usain Bolt won gold at the World Junior Championships when he was merely 15 years of age. The commission will instead focus on those youngsters who have registered world-standard performances, as testing is not cheap - costing US$500 each.

"If you're selected on the national team to go away, that person will be tested. We are not going to be testing people in physical education and stuff like that, so they can perish that thought," the JADCo official stated. "You have to be at the highest level."

Vice-president of ISSA, Keith Wellington, also called for clear guidelines on the process of testing as the students are minors.

"ISSA is supportive of any measure that will enhance our ability to continue to provide healthy and fair competition," Wellington, who is also the principal of St Elizabeth Technical High School, expressed. "We are, however, mindful of the need to ensure that any testing of our students competing in intra-school sports be guided by the fact that these are usually minors competing in recreational activities.

"Additionally, a programme for testing our students should include clearly defined guidelines for access to these students and the procedure to be followed in determining who is tested."

ryon.jones@gleanerjm.com

http://jamaica-gleaner.com/gleaner/2...s/sports6.html

[Sir X]

Educated fools ,they just line up , no question of ramifications or who benefits from this purpose , surely not us !

The master has won another round.

[Islandman]

I really can't see this being implemented across the board, way too expensive.

If we are testing the juniors who are national representatives at events like World Juniors and World Youth that should be sufficient.

[Sir X]

common sense has to prevail ?

[Karl]

For ISSA be even thinking about testing the youth is an indictment on that body. Idiots!!

[Gamma]

Karl we agree on this!!!

[Karl]

...and more.

Karl we agree on this!!!

Glad to see that lately we have been agreeing on so many things . Hopefully you shall review my past statements and see the gems in some of of them.

Implicit in your agreeing with me - Good to see that you also saw the difference in compliance with testing at our high school levels with that when our juniors perform at international meets.

-----

Yup! ...the below argument for testing our kids and the concluding sentence I I disagree with and dismiss!
EDUCATION AND TESTING IS THE WAY TO GO TO SAVE FACE

Since this doping issue became a really big deal a couple weeks ago when five of our athletes including the beloved Asafa Powell, the former 100-metre world record holder, and Sherone Simpson returned adverse findings of their ‘A’ samples, the discussion about doping has been vigorous.

Once more the myth that Jamaica athletes don’t consume performance enhancers has been debunked because no one can say for sure that many of the 18 or so cases since 2008 were not deliberate attempts by our athletes to get an advantage over their rivals. No matter how one tries to spin it, to believe that every single one of those cases was inadvertent would be naive. This is not to say that the two named athletes were intentionally cheating. We have to wait for all the information surrounding their respective cases before we can come to some form of a conclusion.

The discussion has now turned to whether or not we should test our world class teenagers who do so well at Champs, CARIFTA and the respective global meets in which they compete each year. At the recently concluded World Youth Championships, for example, Jamaican student athletes set two world records, one athlete came within 0.01 seconds of another and others produced world best performances that saw Jamaica win six gold medals to finish atop the medal table for the first time in a global event. Ironically, it was that same day that Jamaica secured it’s fifth and sixth gold medals to secure that top ranking that news broke that their senior counterparts had seemingly run afoul of the World Anti-Doping Agency (WADA) code.

In response to proposals that our high school athletes get tested locally, a proposal that had been ignored previously when first mooted years ago but now returns as a viable solution now that our athletes have once more been shamed in the global spotlight, many stakeholders are voicing resistance.

How can they test our kids? Kids, they argue, already have enough to worry about like their schoolwork, exams and such, how would it be fair to ask them to study the list of banned substances, the more than 1000 substances on the banned list.

The response was expected, especially in a country where it is virtually illegal to expect anyone to be accountable for anything.

The truth is testing high school athletes and couple that with a rigorous education programme is the only way in which we can kick this drug problem we have. We have a tendency to not want to follow rules unless someone is standing over us with a big stick. It speaks to the general indiscipline that runs amok within all spheres of Jamaican society. So until we can learn to police ourselves at an individual level perhaps it is best to have the system police us.

There have been rumours circulating for years that high school athletes do engage in some form of ‘suspect’ practices that result in the guilty having a competitive edge over their rivals. Perhaps that is where it starts. Practice makes perfect, they say, and if a high school athlete is able to get away with it at that level what is to say that he or she won’t try to get away with some form of cheating once they make the transition to the senior ranks where the competition gets even tougher.

I am all for getting into the kids’ faces and those of their parents and support staff as well, with the information they need, exposing them from very early about what they choose to ingest and what they should not be doing once they choose to become world-class athletes. That and testing the very best of them to ensure that Jamaica is spared the embarrassment of having to explain why so many of our athletes are running afoul of the rules, is the direction we need to take.

Heck, they are already being tested when they travel overseas to compete.

Where is the harm if they undergo those tests here at home? Children live what they learn and we definitely need to teach them from early that cheating is not an option because if they cheat they will be caught.

http://gleanerblogs.com/sports/?p=2034

[Gamma]

Let's not get carried away or too crazy, eh?

[Karl]

[Karl]

PM's adviser says thorough discussions needed on high-school

Franklyn: 12 too early to test athletes - PM's adviser says thorough discussions needed on high-school drug scans

Published: Monday | July 29, 2013


FRANKLYN

Jodi-Ann Gilpin, Gleaner Writer

As the debate continues over the idea of performing drug tests on high-school athletes, senior adviser to Prime Minister Portia Simpson Miller, Delano Franklyn, says discussions are ongoing to decide an appropriate age at which to start.

In the aftermath of recent high-profile breaches of anti-doping regulations by professional Jamaican athletes, Simpson Miller recently announced the Government was considering the introduction of a drug-testing programme at high-school sporting events.

Franklyn, who was speaking against the background of suggestions from sports physician Dr Paul Wright that children be tested as early as age 12, emphasised it was imperative that the age for first testing be thoroughly discussed.

AGE THE ISSUE
"The prime minister's announcement is in keeping with international standards, and I am in total agreement. The issue for me is exactly what age and the proposed age announced by Dr Wright to test athletes is just too low and asking too much," he told The Gleaner, following The Mico University College's Class of 1986 Celebration at The Jamaica Pegasus hotel in New Kingston on Saturday.

"The age of 12 is a traumatic age. A child would not be involved in international competition under the rules of WADA (the World Anti-Doping Agency). The age that would be most appropriate has to be one where that kind of parental approval would not be necessary, and my personal age would be 16, but discussions are still ongoing," Franklyn said. "But the age has to be properly thought about, and we are talking about all sports, not just track and field."

He added: "The prime minister, in her presentation, made it clear that before the policy is implemented, the age must be determined and all the relevant stakeholders must come on board and so consultations are ongoing, and critical to it are the Inter-Secondary Schools Sports Association, the education ministry, the JTA (Jamaica Teachers' Association), the Jamaica Athletics Administrative Association and also, from the standpoint of education information, JADCO (Jamaica Anti-Doping Commission)."

Franklyn also called for Jamaicans to support the athletes.
"Let us not be quick to throw them under the bus. Let us not be driven by sensationalism. They (athletes) need our support and we must stand behind them as a country," he asserted.

jodi-ann.gilpin@gleanerjm.com

http://jamaica-gleaner.com/gleaner/2...ead/lead6.html