Аctivity

Research and academic activities of the Olympic Institute are focused on two directions. The first one covers the study of the historical and cultural heritage of the Olympic Games in the context of the modern Olympic sports as a unique and exciting part of the world culture and its place in the system of humanitarian education. The second direction involves a deep study of the system of the sports preparation featuring organic unity of sports and pedagogical, medical and biological, psychological, organizational, and managerial competencies, their systematization and generalization. The matter is that the intensive development of the global sports science over the past three decades, driven by the dramatic rise in popularity, political and social significance of the Olympic sports and its financial capacity, has accumulated a vast array of empirical knowledge on the various aspects of the athletes’ preparation: starting from the identification of sports talents and ending in participation in world championships and the Olympic Games. The main scope of this knowledge rendered in thousands of scientific publications requires study screening of important and promising information; rejection of doubtful, erroneous, or low-significance data; laying theoretical and methodological foundations of the modern system of preparation of elite class athletes, and defining precise methodological applications to its various aspects and sports.

Naturally, utilization of such an approach demands involvement of highly qualified professionals – not only with deep knowledge and broad outlook but also aware of the coaching specifics, needs of coaches and other experts involved in the athletes’ preparation – into work of the Olympic Institute.

The commitment of the Olympic Institute to educational activities, resting on the achievements of modern science and best practices, reflects the results of analytical work in generalized scientific and methodological works, syllabi of academic disciplines, various forms of organization of the educational process – seminars, conferences, webinars, discussion panels, knowledge assessment, execution and defence of theses.

One of the ongoing projects implemented by the Olympic Institute in close collaboration with the National Olympic Committee of Ukraine is a continuous system of online seminars on the most topical issues of the Olympic sports and preparation of athletes. Such weekly seminars were accorded wide recognition: from 500 to 1,000 professionals, not only from Ukraine but also from neighbouring countries, took part in each of them.

The most important activity of the Olympic Institute has been the opening of the Master’s Degree Programme Athletic Preparation and Performance Coaching in an Olympic Sport. The establishment of such an educational structure was conditioned by an urgent need for highly qualified Olympic coaches capable of finding promising children, enhancing their natural talents, bringing them to the level of the highest achievements, providing for their long and successful sports career. In this Master’s Programme, a wealth of special knowledge in the field of the sports preparation is organically complemented with various data from related disciplines on the quality of the training process and potential for its realization.