Four Successful BSc Graduates
Four coaches from the second cohort of the BSc Developing Athletes Through Professional Practice have successfully graduated from Edinburgh Napier University this week.
The students have been working through the two-year course at a challenging time, and the success of the graduates and the results they achieved are a testament to the commitment of the coaches in their own professional development.
Coaching can be a fantastic career, and thanks to the support of sportscotland investing in people through supporting programmes like this, there has been a great response to the course since it began to be offered back in 2017. The funding support helps to subsidise costs – meaning the course is more widely accessible to people from all areas and backgrounds.
The BSc programme is designed to provide an opportunity for coaches to develop their skills, with the degree course focussing on developing high-quality gymnastics coaches. The five modules are delivered in a blended learning approach, with sports coaching experts delivering content – as well as mentoring the coaches in practical and scenario-based sessions.
The graduates will now be able to take what they have learnt and apply the theory to their own coaching practices in order to further develop their gymnasts’ performance and create effective training environments.
Beth Paterson, lead women’s artistic coach at Jump Gymnastics Club said: “I’ve done gymnastics since I was younger, but I was never a competitive gymnast. Now I love coaching competitive gymnasts myself and everything that we learnt on the course, we got to practice in the gym, with our athletes.”
Now I know there’s always more to learn, I can go and ask, and research the best way to do things. I’d recommend anyone to do the course, it’s a great way to make friends and build up your coaching support network.
Edinburgh Napier University course lecturer, Cedric English praised the coaches for their passion and celebrated some of the excellent work that had been submitted as part of assessments. He gave special mention to Anna Macdonald and Beth Paterson who achieved a very high level of results.
A huge congratulations to the following graduates, and we wish them all the best with their future coaching careers. Please note, applications for future courses are on hold – please email the team for more information if you are interested in applying.
BSc Developing Athletes Through Professional Practice 2021 Graduates
Anna Macdonald – Alloa Gymnastics Club
Beth Paterson – Jump Gymnastics Club
Nicole Higginson – Astro Gymnastics Club
Shannon Archer – South Essex Gymnastics Club
You can find out more about the course by visiting the below pages.
> Becoming a Coach