One weekend in May I was invited to judge the first annual Uganda Junior Championships hosted by the International School of Uganda. My expectation of the event based on the initial invitation was that it was going to be about 10 girls doing floor routines for an in-house competition type event, but when I arrived there were about 60 kids from three countries, a team of assistant judges from Kenya, banners and awards, and even a makeshift balance beam. It turned out to be quite an event and was so fun!
The kids performed a floor exercise routine that included 8 specific skills based on what level they were competing in. There was girls beginner, intermediate, and advanced and boys 6-8, 9-11, 1-14, and 14+. In between levels, the teams did group performances and exhibition routines.
There were 4 teams from international schools and 5 private clubs participating in the meet. It was the first time the international schools and clubs have teamed up to host a competition and there were a ton of people who put a lot of work into the event to make it a success.
(*I wish I had more pictures but unfortunately they all got taken on others phones! Opps!)
Future of Uganda Gymnastics
There were quite a few kids which was very promising for the sport of gymnastics in Uganda. Pair that with the massive number of kids I've seen flipping and doing parkour on the streets and there is no shortage of potential, talent, and strength here. The one thing that stood out to me was despite this enthusiasm for the sport, there are a lot of underlying systems that need to be established to ensure and support long-term sustainability and growth for the sport over the next 5, 10, 20 years.
Organizational Structure
-Organizational Standard Rules and Policies need to be established and discussions on what is the standard equipment, standard competition procedures, etc. for developmental programs need to be decided.
-Organizational Leadership Structure of who will enforce rules and policies, and what are the consequences for not abiding by rules and policies, etc.
-Technical Committee needed to decide what curriculum/ program to follow (ie: more of a USAG level system, or the FIG compulsory system, or a hybrid of both?)
-Meet hosting education is needed on how to run a meet, how to find judges, how to organize kids, how to keep time, etc.
Coaches Education
-Coaches educational trainings to provide good quality and safe instruction for the kids-Technical training or how to teach and execute specific skills.
-Practice management training about how to run a class, how to organize large groups of children into levels, and how to facilitate an organized lesson plan for skill development.
-Coaching mentorship/apprenticeships to train future generations of coaches to enable the growth and continuity of the sport of gymnastics
Judging Education
-Judging education on recruiting judges, providing technical training of how to take deductions, how to calculate routine competition, standard general faults and penalties
-Judges training on how to reduce and combat implicit bias and maintain high moral standards in competition scoring
-Judges education on standard meet procedures
I would love to see the FIG continue to aid in the development of gymnastics in East Africa. The president of the FIG, Morinari Watanabe, visited Uganda earlier last year (April 2022) to prepare a Gymnastics Development plan and has said the FIG aims to help Uganda with acquiring a training center, equipment, and technical development/personnel in the country but it has been extremely hard to find any sort of information on the endeavor and it's progress.
There's so much potential here and so much joy and enthusiasm for the sport, my hope is that this is just the beginning for gymnastics here in Uganda and East Africa.
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