Archery to be introduced at National School Championship

By Avenash Ramzan

The sport of Archery, currently in the midst of a ground-breaking Level One Coaching Course, received good news on Thursday when Director of Sport Christopher Jones announced that discussions are being held surrounding the inclusion of the event in the annual National School Championship.

Delivering remarks at the official opening ceremony of the eight-day course, conducted by Instructor Phillip Graves, Jones told the gathering of Archery Guyana representatives and participants from various regions at the National Resource Centre that the development of Archery is on the National Sports Commission’s works programme.

“There is indeed a document which speaks to Archery being introduced into the School Nationals and as such, coordinating and collaborating with Archery Guyana to ensure this programme happens is part of the National Sports Commission’s works programme,” Jones said.

He continued, “We have been speaking with CEO (Chief Education Officer) of the Ministry of Education (Marcel) Hutson, who would have assured us that leading into School Nationals this year 2018 we are hoping that there will be a special event in which you will see students from Regions One, Seven, Eight and Nine participating in Archery. This is history in the making.”

“Of course we do not intend to limit it to those regions; all of the participants here who at the end of this programme will receive a Level One certificate, they too will be coordinated by Archery Guyana and you will see them doing the same training programme in the other regions. We’re hoping that in 2019 at the School Nationals we could then have all 10 regions participating in Archery.”

If those plans come to fruition then students will compete in four disciplines at the 2018 Nationals- Cycling, Swimming, Track and Field and Archery.

Archery Guyana was officially launched in Guyana in August 2015. It falls under the umbrella of the Guyana Sports Shooting Foundation.