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New ISSA boss targets new HQ, quality football
BY DANIA BOGLE Observer staff reporter bogled@jamaicaobserver.com
Sunday, September 02, 2007
A place for the Inter-Secondary School Sports Association (ISSA) to call home, complete with its own mini-stadium and courts, is the dream of new boss Dr Walton Small.
SMALL... we could rent facilities to help run some competitions
The ISSA president hopes this dream will start to come true during his tenure, along with more competition between rural and urban football teams, and an interactive website.
The Montego Bay native, who was voted in on June 15 to replace long-time president Clement Radcliffe, said even if there is no building, he hopes to secure the property, or at least an artist's sketch of what the building should look like, whether or not he is asked to serve beyond the next two years.
"This building is inadequate," he said, referring to ISSA's present headquarters - a renovated house at 21 Lindsay Crescent in Kingston.
"If you're looking at developing an organisation and taking it to another level you have to look way beyond the tip of your nose. I'm thinking a nice multi-storey building, a stadium with running track, football field, netball courts," he added.
Dr Small said this facility could significantly reduce the cost of staging the annual Boys' and Girls' Athletic Championships which currently run into millions of dollars because of the cost of renting the National Stadium.
"If we have our own, at least for the first two days or so we can do our run-offs there and just use the Stadium for the last two days," he said.
"There are some sports at ISSA which do not attract any sponsors and if we have this facility we could even look at renting it out and using the funds to help to run some of those other competitions which get no sponsorship at all," he added.
Dr Small, who was named chairman of the daCosta Cup football competition in 2002 - four years after becoming principal of St James-based Anchovy High in 1998 - told the Sunday Observer he has already asked Glenmuir's coach Patrick 'Jackie' Walters to examine a competition structure which would have rural and urban football teams meeting more than just for the Olivier Shield and help lift the standard of the sport at the same time.
"When you look sometimes at the teams that go through to the second round, it's amazing that a team can go through and get nine- and 10-nil when a quality team cannot go through because of how it is zoned," Dr Small said.
"If we can develop strategically a structure where students go and play competitive football, I'm sure the quality will improve and the same thing goes for other sports.," he stated.
A schools' volleyball competition is on the agenda as well, with a chairperson having already being appointed to get the contest underway in the coming school year.
"I'm almost 90 per cent sure we can get it started before the end of this sporting year," said the ISSA boss.
The father of five who earned a PhD in Educational Administration from Ball State University in Indiana in 1995, said the creation of a website which will make access to results of games and registration for certain events easier for schools has already been examined.
"The technology of nowadays. ISSA is an organisation which has a large diaspora and you need an interactive website where people can go and get updates and yes, it's going to cost money, but I think that's where we need to go," he said.
The Cornwall College old boy who taught biology, chemistry and physics at his alma mater, before moving to Bethlehem Teachers College where he taught professional subjects, will be setting up office hours when he will travel to Kingston to make it easier for various ISSA interests to have access to him.
"It's something I want to set that the public knows that they can call me at the office and they will have access to the president because sometimes just a talk can alleviate a lot of the concerns," Dr Small said.
BY DANIA BOGLE Observer staff reporter bogled@jamaicaobserver.com
Sunday, September 02, 2007
A place for the Inter-Secondary School Sports Association (ISSA) to call home, complete with its own mini-stadium and courts, is the dream of new boss Dr Walton Small.
SMALL... we could rent facilities to help run some competitions
The ISSA president hopes this dream will start to come true during his tenure, along with more competition between rural and urban football teams, and an interactive website.
The Montego Bay native, who was voted in on June 15 to replace long-time president Clement Radcliffe, said even if there is no building, he hopes to secure the property, or at least an artist's sketch of what the building should look like, whether or not he is asked to serve beyond the next two years.
"This building is inadequate," he said, referring to ISSA's present headquarters - a renovated house at 21 Lindsay Crescent in Kingston.
"If you're looking at developing an organisation and taking it to another level you have to look way beyond the tip of your nose. I'm thinking a nice multi-storey building, a stadium with running track, football field, netball courts," he added.
Dr Small said this facility could significantly reduce the cost of staging the annual Boys' and Girls' Athletic Championships which currently run into millions of dollars because of the cost of renting the National Stadium.
"If we have our own, at least for the first two days or so we can do our run-offs there and just use the Stadium for the last two days," he said.
"There are some sports at ISSA which do not attract any sponsors and if we have this facility we could even look at renting it out and using the funds to help to run some of those other competitions which get no sponsorship at all," he added.
Dr Small, who was named chairman of the daCosta Cup football competition in 2002 - four years after becoming principal of St James-based Anchovy High in 1998 - told the Sunday Observer he has already asked Glenmuir's coach Patrick 'Jackie' Walters to examine a competition structure which would have rural and urban football teams meeting more than just for the Olivier Shield and help lift the standard of the sport at the same time.
"When you look sometimes at the teams that go through to the second round, it's amazing that a team can go through and get nine- and 10-nil when a quality team cannot go through because of how it is zoned," Dr Small said.
"If we can develop strategically a structure where students go and play competitive football, I'm sure the quality will improve and the same thing goes for other sports.," he stated.
A schools' volleyball competition is on the agenda as well, with a chairperson having already being appointed to get the contest underway in the coming school year.
"I'm almost 90 per cent sure we can get it started before the end of this sporting year," said the ISSA boss.
The father of five who earned a PhD in Educational Administration from Ball State University in Indiana in 1995, said the creation of a website which will make access to results of games and registration for certain events easier for schools has already been examined.
"The technology of nowadays. ISSA is an organisation which has a large diaspora and you need an interactive website where people can go and get updates and yes, it's going to cost money, but I think that's where we need to go," he said.
The Cornwall College old boy who taught biology, chemistry and physics at his alma mater, before moving to Bethlehem Teachers College where he taught professional subjects, will be setting up office hours when he will travel to Kingston to make it easier for various ISSA interests to have access to him.
"It's something I want to set that the public knows that they can call me at the office and they will have access to the president because sometimes just a talk can alleviate a lot of the concerns," Dr Small said.
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