14 April 2009

Singapore sports scene update

Youth sports development gets $15m boost@Straits Times

The Singapore Youth Sports Development (SYSD) committee announced yesterday that $15 million will be jointly committed by the Ministry of Community, Youth and Sports (MCYS), the Ministry of Education (MOE) and the Singapore Totalisator Board to support youth sports development initiatives.

The committee, jointly set up by MCYS and MOE last September, will allocate $5 million for training athletes for the YOG, with the remaining $10 million to be used for developing a national talent framework in schools.

While Singapore's estimated 535,000 students under the age of 18 go through physical education lessons, only 10 per cent represent their schools in competitions.

Among the plans to unearth more talent and grow the sporting pool are the formation of training centres for each of the 26 YOG sports.

Specialised workshops and programmes will also be organised, on top of more sports medicine and sports science support.

SSC to channel S$58.8m to NSAs this year@CNA

More money will be channelled to National Sports Associations (NSAs) this year. S$58.8 million will be disbursed, a 25 per cent increase from the S$47 million given out last year.

Most of the additional funds will go towards helping the associations prepare for the upcoming Asian Youth Games.

NSAs can also look forward to multi-year planning, and funds will be made available to those with good and viable programmes.

Sports Council rolls out plans to reach the very young in pre-schools@CNA

There are some 194,000 children under the age of four in Singapore and the Singapore Sports Council (SSC) hopes to get them to embrace sports even at this tender age by developing a Fundamental Skills Programme for those aged 18 months to six years old.

Details are being worked out, but about a S$100,000 will be spent to develop the curriculum. The council will also work with private sector companies to roll out the programme in pre-school institutions later this year.

8 new schools chosen to train promising young athletes@CNA

The Education Ministry's talent spotting scheme for young athletes has been expanded to include eight new schools.

Yio Chu Kang Primary School is one of the newest Junior Sports Academies, tasked to identify and train promising talent in sports such as shooting, fencing and swimming.

Four of these centralised training institutes were set up in 2008 and since then, they have trained 260 young athletes in wushu, table-tennis, badminton, and track and field.

The eight new schools are Anglican High School, Anglo-Chinese (Primary), Catholic High School, Yio Chu Kang Primary, Ahmad Ibrahim Secondary, Nan Hua Primary, Pasir Ris Crest Secondary, Paya Lebar Methodist Girls' (Secondary) School.

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