Coach King Commences MEMOS Programme

Physical education teacher and coach Jesse King has been selected to participate in the Executive Masters in Sport Organisations Management, MEMOS XXVI Programme, which commenced on August 15, 2023, and runs until September 2024.

The Barbados Olympic Association (BOA) Inc. recommended King for the Olympic Solidarity Scholarship to pursue the course. MEMOS delivers a comprehensive training programme and support to empower professionals working in national or international sports bodies to manage their organisations more effectively.  

King has a lifelong passion for sports and has been involved in various roles throughout his career. He has been an athlete, coach, official and sports administrator. Among his most notable accomplishments was being awarded a track-and-field scholarship in 2006 to attend McKendree University in the United States, where he earned a National Collegiate Athletic Association All-American Award for 110-metre hurdles.

For almost 10 years, King has been a physical education teacher and coach at the Springer Memorial School, and his interest in youth development led him to become the founder and general secretary of the Talons Track and Field Club. In recent years, he has worked closely with the Barbados Amateur Weightlifting Association (BAWA) as a technical official.

The MEMOS Programme will enhance King’s capabilities as it covers a wide range of topics related to sports management, including strategic management, leadership and human resource management, financial management and project and event management. MEMOS also provides a valuable opportunity for hands-on learning whereby each participant must complete an individual project to improve the management of their sports organisation.

Coach King is keen to enrol in the programme and looks forward to developing his project and defending it in Switzerland in September 2024. He explained that the project is intended to benefit not only the BAWA but also sports in Barbados generally.

“The project is twofold. It aims to help athletes to use a strength in one sporting discipline, in this instance, strength and conditioning in weightlifting, and apply it for success to another, track-and-field. In doing this, we expect to see greater participation in weightlifting, including females, and in turn an improvement in their track-and-field results.”

King also said, ‘In the grand scheme of things, I see this MEMOS project as being the pilot for a larger research project that looks at transitioning school-aged athletes to professional athletes in developing countries. Most of our better sportsmen and women must leave Barbados to train. I am trying to build a programme and a template that will prepare local athletes across sporting disciplines for all the major competitions without having to leave Barbados and, in the long term, for all stages of a professional career in sports. So instead of athletes having to stop competing at 17 or 18, because they didn’t get an athletic scholarship, they would have an opportunity to continue to train and compete up to age 24 or longer if they are successful’.

This seasoned coach is commending the BOA and the National Olympic Academy for their commitment to educating local coaches, officials and administrators to take various sports to greater heights. King said the MEMOS programme will assist with his personal and professional development, and he intends to use the skills he develops to pay it forward.