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| | School of Communication Studies Hosts African Sports Journalists |    | | |  African sports journalists are attending a refresher course hosted by the School of Communication Studies at the University of Ghana. The 10-day course, under the theme: “Covering Sports and Development: Getting the Balance Right” is being facilitated by resource persons from the Radio Netherlands Training Centre (RNTC). The course would enable participants brainstorm and sharpen their technical and editorial skills in sports reporting.
Welcoming the team to the University, Pro-Vice-Chancellor, Academic and Student Affairs, Prof. Kwesi Yankah, said the University has a vast pool of disciplines and human resources, which makes it appropriately positioned to address issues of relevance to nation building. He said issues of gender, sports, and journalism should therefore throw up several important issues for discussion including the mainstreaming of minority groups, and changing of cultural perceptions about women and sports.
Prof. Yankah noted that the University was committed to sports, which was evident in the elevation of an office for sports to a Directorate, to open up its scope of participation in sports, and also making sports an academic discipline. He added that students as from the next academic year will have the opportunity to offer sports for academic credit.
The Pro-Vice-Chancellor said it was time to include gender issues to the dimensions of sports, to help erase the perceptions about women in sports.
 A representative from the RNTC, Ginger De Silva, said the team was honoured to be at the University. She hoped that the partnership between the two institutions that are committed to improving the understanding of the nature and process of communications, and to raising standard in communications to the public sphere would be enhanced. She described the theme as a very complex one, loaded with landmines of social and culture issues, but hoped that the programme would present an opportunity for participants to think through issues, while seeking ways to improve and sharpen their journalistic skills.
The Acting Director of the School of Communication Studies, Dr. Margaret Ivy Amoakohene in brief remarks, said Ghanaians were mostly united by sports. She noted that even though sports is an instrument for collective identity, not much has been done to improve female participation and support for sporting activities involving women. She added that even in cases where women have excelled in sports, they have been seen as encroaching on a male dominated area.
Dr. Amoakohene emphasised the need to project other sporting activities other than soccer. She urged the participants to use the training as an opportunity to discuss a wide range of issues relating to sports.
Earlier, in introductory remarks, Ms. Sarah Akrofi-Quarcoo, Co-ordinator of the programme and lecturer at the School said sports reporters have consciously or unconsciously tilted the gender balance in reporting sports in favour of men and studies across the globe, have documented some of these disparities. Ms. Akrofi-Quarcoo who is also an alumna of RNTC said the course focuses on the continuing need for Journalists to see sports in broader terms, and offer the Journalists opportunities to refresh and develop new approaches and new perspectives on sports as a force for development and for promotion of gender equality.
She noted that with the rapid development and spread of social media and new media technologies, Journalists have new ways not only of reporting and compiling stories but also involving people especially young women in getting the gender balance right in sports reporting.
The ceremony was attended by the Director of the Sports Directorate, Dr. Emmanuel Owusu-Ansah and the Acting Director of Public Affairs Directorate, Mrs. Stella A. Amoa.
Click to view the Opening Address | | | | Date Published: 06/06/2011 | | | |   |
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