National coaches to be certified by KONI

National coaches to be certified by KONI

JAKARTA (JP): The National Sports Council (KONI) will issue
certificates for coaches in a bid to standardize coaching
methods, KONI's officer in charge of research and development
Imam Sujudi said on Wednesday.

Imam said the certificates would be needed by any coaches who
wanted to train national athletes for international multisports
events such as the Southeast Asian (SEA) Games and Asian Games.

He said the coaches appointed by their sports organizations to
coach for the 2001 SEA Games in Kuala Lumpur must have
certificates.

"Coaches must have certificates from KONI as a license to
coach. We want to have a standardized training system," Imam said
after a meeting with research and development officers from the
30 sports organizations taking part in the biennial event.

KONI will open the screening program for coaches before it
begins its centralized training program for the SEA Games in
January.

Imam said coaches would be graded based upon four levels:
basic, muda (junior), madya (intermediate) and utama (advanced).
Any coaches who had trained the national team in the past would
automatically fall into the madya and utama levels.

"KONI will stage a special course for any coaches who have
never received certificate from their international sports
organization. The course will last about 100 hours," he said.

However, Imam admitted that he did not know how the courses
would be financed.

"We may submit a request to the IOC asking for financial aid
to improve the coaches' abilities. Usually we get about US$5,000
to hold a coaching course."

Regarding coaches who have been acknowledged by international
sports organizations, Imam said they were obliged to get formal
certification from KONI.

"International sports organizations are legal bodies and we
will not argue about their legitimate status. If a coach has
earned an international coaching certificate, he will only need
to formalize it with KONI."

Imam also said that KONI was still discussing the possibility
of setting up a body that would accredit international coaching
certificates.

"We don't know which organization will give the accreditation.
We used to have such an organization but it's not functioning
anymore."

He also pledged that there would be no financial exploitation
behind the issuing of the coaching certificates.

"Hopefully, no such practices will emerge," he said. (ivy)