Six Vincentians in UWI’s Historic Adventure
2024 appears to be a historic one for sports in St Vincent and the Grenadines in many respects. The most recent addition to our national sports archives is the six Vincentian students who have been amongst the 17 members of the first cohort to graduate from the University of the West Indies Global Campus Academy of Sport. The Recognition Ceremony was conducted, via Zoom, on Friday 15 November, with the Keynote Address delivered by myself, in my capacity as President of the Caribbean Association of National Olympic Committees (CANOC).
Kelisha Yorke, Godfrey Harry, Samantha Lynch, Shanique DeShong, Tessica Cupid, and Travis Forbes, were all successful in their challenging journey through the programme that allowed them to achieve a new level of knowledge and practical skills in sport.
Yorke, Harry and Lynch earned First Class honours while the other three earned Second Class honours. Yorke and DeShong got the Bsc. Sports Leadership and Management with a minor in Facilities Management, Harry and Lynch got the BSc. Sports Coaching while Forbes and Cupid earned the BSc, Sports Kinetics.
They each deserve the highest commendation as they add to the growing number of Vincentian sport personnel with degrees from a most reputable university, UWI.
Four of our students received special awards as follows:
Best Advocate- Mrs. Kelisha Ashton-Yorke
Sport Personality Female- Ms. Petra Samantha Lynch
Sport Administrator Female- Ms. Shanique DeShong
Sport Administrator Male- Mr. Godfrey Harry
Sport Culture
Because of the absence of a sports culture in St Vincent and the Grenadines we have too often downplayed the role of sport in national development.
It is unfortunate that given this country’s impressive sporting history and even after Independence, nation’s leaders consistently fail to address the fact that they have contributed little or nothing towards the systematic inculcation of a sports culture. At times we are forced to ponder whether they have ever taken the time to understand precisely what constitutes a nation’s sports culture.
There is no leadership of sport at the governmental level. This has been the case for several decades, regardless of the political party that holds the reins of government and for however long. This is evidence of the persistence of the colonial legacy that insisted on sport as privileged recreational activity.
In the post Independent St Vincent and the Grenadines, political leadership has essentially seen sport as an important pathway to earning the youth vote every five years or whenever the situation demands.
Since Independence, successive governments here have failed to acknowledge that, if properly organised, sport is important enough to the nation’s economy to justify its own ministerial portfolio rather than, as has become the norm, an attachment to portfolios deemed far more important to national well-being.
Despite the continuing revelations on the negative impact of non-communicable diseases on our country, and the insistence of health professionals on the role of physical activity and sport on significantly combatting these lifestyle challenges, contemporary leaders consistently fail to do more that pay lip service to sport.
We are reminded that Physical Education (PE) was only introduced in this country, at the secondary schools, after the Caribbean Examinations Council (CXC) established it as an examinable subject a few years ago. It has since taken several years before we started, this year, designating teachers at the nation’s elementary schools as PE teachers.
The Vincentian government and private sector’s sudden awakening during the Paris2024 Olympics once Shafiqua Maloney got past the first round of the 800m, is easily the best example of the lip service referenced in this column. Every effort was made to mobilise the Vincentians community everywhere. Resources were readily procured and the finals transformed into a typical political rally-type occasion that may well have been a concerted effort to push into the background Shafiqua’s own revelations of her needs for the past two years. That is not evidence of a sports culture in our country. At best we are committed to sport adhocracy. We may lay claim to a very high level of efficiency regarding sport adhocracy and sport politicking.
UWI’s initiative
In 2019, the University of the West Indies, under its Open Campus, now Global Campus, began offering sport programmes under its Academy of Sport, for the first time. The intention was to facilitate a consistent flow of graduates professionally trained in blending academia and sport, placing the region, over time, on par with advanced industrial nations around the world, with a strong, consistent and sustainable academic foundation upon which to build.
Given the nonsensical explanations of many media personnel across the international community for the successes of Jamaican sprinters, over the years, the UWI initiative is long overdue. Sound academic sport research will undoubtedly facilitate clarity and end speculation.
CANOC’s Agreement with UWI, signed last year at its Annual General Assembly in Bridgetown, Barbados, paves the way for a sustained effort as archiving the Caribbean’s rich sporting legacy, affording successive generations access to information on the struggles to get to where we are in global sport today.
The first graduating cohort must now carry the torch of the Caribbean’s sport academia programmes, lighting the path for others, ever innovating and engaging our peoples, especially our leaders in government, to an understanding of the critical role that physical activity and sport must be allowed to play in community, national and regional development in the Caribbean geographical space. This message was incorporated in my address to the graduands on Friday last, as follows.
Graduation Address
What immeasurable joy you, the graduates, must be experiencing at this moment, in this space, knowing that this evening you are being celebrated and will yourselves, celebrate, the end of yet another phase of your life’s journey towards and beyond excellence.
This evening, you graduate from the University of the West Indies. But this is no ordinary Graduation. It is an historic occasion. You are the very first graduates from our region’s premier education institution as it breaks ground with the introduction of the Sports Programmes in a new faculty, The Global Campus Academy of Sport.
Put simply, you are a very special group of people, Caribbean pioneers.
You have endured the challenges of what has been an arduous academic adventure, overcame every obstacle, fought the great fight, always imbued by the spirit of true sportsmanship, determination and an unwavering resolve and commitment to success, in your quest to become the next generation of our region’s sport practitioners, sport administrators.
As the President of the Caribbean Association of National Olympic Committees, CANOC, it gives me immense pleasure to be here with you, being part of UWI’s latest innovative undertaking and delivering the keynote address. We welcome you, members of the 2024 Graduating Class, to the gene-pool of Caribbean sport practitioners, fully cognizant that it is the likes of you who will be charged with taking hold of the proverbial baton of sport development, carrying it forward to future generations. CANOC itself, as a premier Caribbean sport institution, could not be prouder. We are eternally grateful for the opportunity afforded us this evening.
Your graduation today comes in the wake of the remarkable achievements of St Lucia’s Julien Alfred, Thea LaFond of Dominica, in winning their countries first gold medals at the Paris2024 Olympics, and Jamaica’s Roje Stona, winning his country’s first Olympic gold in the Discus Throw, highlights of continued Caribbean sporting excellence. These should serve to motivate you to a level of anxiety to get started in your new professional life in sport, eagerly applying the knowledge and skills you have acquired at the UWI’s Academy of Sport, wherever needed.
In 2023, CANOC signed an Agreement with UWI that enhances our collective endeavour to better serve our Caribbean region through sport, building upon the foundations of our rich sporting legacy, and firmly committed to regional integration as an imperative.
For far too long sport and academia have been separated in our region, to the detriment of our individual and collective sport development. CANOC’s intention is to deepen our relations, enhance our collaboration with UWI, through the Faculty of Sport and the relevant Academies in the critically important areas of research, capacity building, athlete engagement and region-specific strategic sport development initiatives.
Our relationship with UWI extends to combining resources towards the development of the Hope Estate Project in Grenada – a multi-sport high performance centre for this region. Not only will this offer a plethora of opportunities for graduates like yourselves, but it ultimately seeks to create linkages amongst our Caribbean organizations, filling and bridging an historical gap which has long inhibited our individual and regional sport development framework. CANOC is proud to be part of this significant project, and we look forward to working closely with the Global Campus as we rally our colleagues in sport, to support this initiative.
Amongst CANOC’s strategic imperatives, is the implementation of our recently approved Sustainability Action Plan, 2025 – 2030, consistent with our signing of the United Nations/International Olympic Committee Sport for Climate action, addressing 14 of the UN’s Sustainable Development Goals; Sport Policy Surveys, Capacity-building Webinars, Seminars and Workshops; and the creation of opportunities for sport graduates to be fully engaged in the broader Caribbean sport development process in all emerging career pathways, ensuring an all-embracing Caribbean Sports Culture. We anticipate that graduates like yourselves and those who follow in your footsteps, will benefit greatly from the experiential learning and experiences gained from being part of the various working teams and committees established to bring these projects to fruition, driving the change that will enable us to stand shoulder to shoulder with our international counterparts in fashioning and sustaining the Caribbean’s sporting landscape.
To the leadership of the Global Campus, Dean Mansingh and members of the Faculty of Sport, I thank you for your continued efforts in re-imagining and reshaping the role that sport plays in the lives of our people and regional development.
CANOC, today, recommits itself to our continued collaborations and the integration of our strategic imperatives. Collectively, we can achieve what we at CANOC insist takes us all, Beyond Possible.
Finally, dear graduates, this evening is about you.
I join with all here gathered in applauding you for having taken the bold ambitious steps towards personal development.
We thank you for recognizing the important role that sport plays in the lives of the peoples of the Caribbean.
We congratulate you on making the transition to professions in sport.
We look forward, with much optimism, to the contributions you will undoubtedly make to the region’s sport culture and through it, to sustainable regional development.
