A multidimensional approach to evaluate the policy effectiveness of elite sport schools in Flanders

Abstract

The increasing demands of elite sports make it difficult for talented young athletes to balance school and sport. This paper investigates the multi-dimensional policy effectiveness of elite sport schools (ESSs) in secondary education in Flanders. Four hundred and eight elite athletes who graduated from an ESS, and 341 from mainstream schools, completed an online survey. The data showed no clear evidence of more effective outputs (performance), or more positive evaluation of throughputs (processes) by athletes who attended an ESS. Athletes who did not attend an ESS received less support services, but those who did receive such services were generally more satisfied. They were equally satisfied about their coaches’ expertise. Only training facilities were rated generally better in an ESS. The study concluded that evaluating effectiveness of ESS (at input-throughput-output level) requires a tailor-made, sport-specific approach. Furthermore, as ESS is only a small part of a total career, many other factors influence long-term success.

Acknowledgements

This research was funded by the Government of Flanders, Department of Culture, Youth, Sport and Media and would not have been possible without the collaborative efforts of Bloso and the federations. We wish to acknowledge these organizations, as well as the athletes who responded to the surveys.

Notes

1. In general, we use the term ‘federation’ to describe the governing body of a specific sport (similar to National Governing Body (NGB) in the UK and National Sport Organizations (NSOs) in Australia or the USA. The federations manage competitions, rules, regulations and championships for their sport. European countries mostly use ‘federations’. Typical examples of federations include Athletics Canada, the Flemish Gymnastics Federation and the Lawn Tennis Association (also known as British Tennis).

2. According to Field (2013, 532), it is important to report effect sizes with the Mann–Whitney U test to obtain a standardized measure of the size of the effect observed. As SPSS does not calculate an effect size, but converts the test statistics into a z-score, the z-score was converted into the effect size as follows: .

3. In addition to the subsidies from Bloso, federations also add their own funding to run the ESS. Furthermore, parents of students pay a fixed amount (per student), ranging from less than 1000 euros for 81% of the students who are not in boarding schools (n = 111) to less than 3000 euros per year for 78% of the students who stay in boarding schools (n = 215). The prices are sport specific and depend on different factors, such as the number of international competitions that athletes have to participate in. During the interviews, for example, the high performance director indicated that the price in tennis is on average 12,500 euros per year for an U16 athlete. In the surveys, only 1.8% of the athletes outside an ESS indicated that cost was a barrier to them entering the ESS.

4. See Note 2.

5. In Flanders, higher education is organized at two levels. Higher education colleges offer professional bachelors; universities offer an academic bachelor and master education. There are 17 higher education colleges and 6 universities in Flanders.