National Collegiate Athletic Association |
The NCAA News - News & FeaturesOctober 28, 1996Reasonable opportunities to educate student-athletes and coaches on health and safety issuesSince its inception in 1986, NCAA sports sciences has committed significant energy to producing educational materials on health and safety issues in collegiate athletics. The NCAA Sports Medicine Handbook and drug-education materials were initial efforts, while more recent projects addressed nutrition and eating disorders, HIV and AIDS in intercollegiate athletics, and spitting tobacco. In the past few years through outreach at many national meetings, the committee has made significant progress in promoting the sports-sciences message to the medical community, and to a lesser extent, to the athletics administrators. However, the student-athlete and coach audiences are often missed with the traditional mass distribution of health and safety information through the athletics department.The committee also recognizes that other organizations produce relevant health and safety information. The NCAA Sports Sciences Speakers Grant Program and this newsletter were developed to tap into these resources. Even with these established mechanisms, the committee recognizes limitations in reaching the majority of student-athletes and coaches. Recent Association commitments in three areas -- national and individual student-athlete advisory committees, CHAMPS/Life Skills program and coaches professional development seminars -- create an outstanding opportunity to provide health and safety education to coaches and student-athletes. Recommendations: 1. Maintain committee presence and outreach at major medical and athletics administrators meetings. 2. Continue NCAA support for CHAMPS/Life Skills program with a goal of program implementation in each member institution. 3. Seek creative avenues to get health and safety information to student-athletes, such as school newspapers, magazines (e.g., Sports Illustrated), a home page on the World Wide Web, toll-free telephone numbers and pamphlets. 4. Review the Speakers Grant Program to maximize use and application for student-athlete education. 5. Continue to develop a productive relationship with the Student-Athlete Advisory Committee when addressing health and safety issues. 6. Support coaches professional development seminars and include health and safety issues as a topic. 7. Initiate a long-term goal of NCAA coaches certification in health and safety issues, in addition to those discussed elsewhere in this report. |