Study to be made of netball in schools

Press, 14 February 1986, Page 22

Study to be made of netball in schools

Netball’s first national co-ordinator for the game in schools, Marian Smith, sees her job as finding “the state of the nation of netball.” The New Zealand Netball Association announced Smith’s year-long appointment to coach and analyse netball from primary to secondary school level last week. The Auckland schoolteacher is the former coach of the North Shore team and in recent years the top club side, Carmel Mainzeal.

Smith said during the next 12 months she wants to visit all 27 netball associations in New Zealand, discovering the current situation of coaches, teachers and players, and

what they want in the future from netball. "I will try to be helpful to coaches and teachers. Where there are coaches in schools, I will have a chat to them and find out what problems they are having,” she said. Smith will be looking for feedback from teachers and players rather than going to tell them what they should be doing. “I will be aiming to set guidelines for a new netball programme in schools. At the end of the year I want a manual produced, based on my research, with clear guidelines for schools; It will be a big job to write it and I don’t know if I will be the one to do it,”

she said. The idea of a national co-ordinator was not, Smith said, an indication that netball was beginning to suffer at a school level. “I don’t think netball is at a low ebb in our schools. There is a drop off in the numbers participating after high school level, and that may be something we just have to live with.” Smith is keen to promote more than just success at the game. “I want to encourage more than just the competitive side of the sport, so that even those who do not want to play at least will appreciate and understand it, and be left with more than just a feeling

of playing a game,” she said. With the work comes a lot of travelling and at the moment Smith is working out her travel plans. ’.‘l will not be visiting all schools in every area. I will take certains ones as sample schools, as a; reflection of the association in that region,” she said. Smith said she was unsure of her plans at the end of the year, although she has a few ideas. ’ “The ultimate thing would be to make a com- * parative study of schools in another country, but I 3 don’t know what will happen,” she said. SUSAN GOODSON, NZPA staff correspondent