50 delegates from 32 of Tennis Europe’s member nations attended the recent Tennis Europe Coach Education Conference in Antalya. The event was held from 21-22 November at the Kaya Palazzo Resort, where it was hosted by the Turkish Tennis Federation.
Following on from events in Vilamoura in 2011 and Valencia in 2013, this was the third occasion that Tennis Europe devoted the Specific Theme Conference to the topic of Coach Education, and serves to continue the work that is being done by the organisation to improve the availability of knowledge and resources to the coaching community.
The majority of presentations focused on the topic of facilitating tools for competency-based coach education. Each day included interactive sessions with group discussions and a panel debate on the topic of recognition of previously acquired competencies.
Delegates were also informed about the tools available for coaches and federations at tenniscoached.com, Tennis Europe’s new online resource centre, and from key partner of the project, OrangeCoach.
Many of the delegates stayed on site after the Tennis Europe conference in order to participate at the ITF’s Worldwide Coaches Workshop, which was held later that week at the same location. The event is the world’s most important biennial gathering of international coaches.
ITF/Tennis Europe Development Officer and conference organiser Hrvoje Zmajic said; “This third coach education conference in five years underlines both the importance of the topic as well as the interest of the European nations in developing this key area. The speakers came from several leading tennis nations as well as some of the smaller countries in Europe to share their experiences and ideas regarding the facilitating tools in competency-based coach education. This readiness to share and discuss the best practices in coach education - as well as all other aspects of tennis - is one of the strengths of the European region, and something that Tennis Europe will continue to nurture in the future.”