Understanding the importance of nurturing the sportspersons from the school level, the Ministry of Education launched its 2017-2021 five-year vision last week in the presence of Hon. Ministry of Education Akila Viraj Kariyawasam.
Addressing the key issues of the lack of sports teachers in schools, the Hon. Minister added that currently the vision to employ a total of 3850 sports advisors is underway and the gazette notice is currently being processed.
“We have forwarded the proposal to employ 3850 individuals to the position of sports instructors and have forwarded the necessary cabinet notice”
“This position will be important and closely looked at as we are looking at the respective individual’s sports skills and experience over his education qualification”
The Hon. Minister in his address made the intentions very clear with the post of sports advisor as he expects the instructors to be occupied entirely on the field and not be another classroom teacher.
“The sports instructors will be allowed to report to duty in their respective sports attire and their main focus will be out of the office. They will work to train the students and will not need to be in classroom” he further added.
Speaking at the launch of the sports vision, Special Advisor for the Ministry of Education Sunil Jayaweera added that the ministry hopes to transform the Homagama Mahinda Rajapaksa Sports facility to a fully-fledged sports school that will allow students to train in an in-house facility.
“15 acres from the Homagama complex have been allocated by the government to build a sports school. This will be the first of its kind where we pick the best athletes and they will get the chance to train in a state of the art facility along with their normal studies.”
This National Sports School is expected to house a maximum of 700 students and will be one of the proposals put forward in the Sports Vision and the necessary funds have been already allocated by the Prime Minister to the Education minister.
Speaking further, Jayaweera added there will be amendments coming for the much-debated sports law in the coming years to make the sports regulations more feasible for both the bodies and the sportspersons.
