THE increase in participation from public school students is one of the goals of the 2018 Cebu City Olympics, which is set to open on Nov. 14 at the Cebu City Sports Center (CCSC).
One of the changes this year is that the Cebu Schools Athletic Foundation Inc. (Cesafi) schools will no longer be part of the units and will represent their own schools.
“This means more exposure for public school students. We have seen a lot of potentials from them and we hope they step up in this year’s Cebu City Olympics,” said Schools Division Superintendent Dr. Bianito Dagatan in a press conference on Monday, Nov. 12, at the Department of Education (DepEd) Cebu City Division office.
The secondary division will have nine units and the Cesafi schools, while the elementary division will have eight units.
“The intramurals, district meets, and unit meets are done. It’s now time for the athletes to showcase their skills in the Cebu City Olympics. This is the road for them to the Cviraa (Central Visayas Regional Athletic Association) and the Palarong Pambansa,” said division sports coordinator Francis Ramirez.
Ramirez said that more than 15,000 athletes are set to compete in various events that will be held at the CCSC, Sugbu grounds at the South Road Properties, Labangon Elementary School, Cebu City Sports Institute, SM Seaside, Don Bosco Technological Center gym, City Green and University of Cebu (UC) table tennis gym.
The sports to be competed are archery, arnis, athletics, baseball, basketball, badminton, billiards, boxing, chess, dancesports, futsal, football, gymnastics, karatedo, scrabble, sepak takraw, softball, swimming, taekwondo, tennis, table tennis, volleyball, wrestling, wushu.
Ramirez said that in the team sports, only the top three Cesafi schools are allowed to compete. But the dual and individual sports will have no restrictions.
“If we let the 10 Cesafi schools join the team sports, it will look like another Cesafi competition,” he said.
The multi-sporting event for secondary and elementary level students will take place on Nov. 14 to 18.
“What we have in mind here is the preparation and team composition for our participation in Cviraa,” said Dagatan, who announced that Cviraa meet will be hosted by Dumaguete City in the last week of February. “We need to double our time to improve our performance.”
The winners in the Cviraa meet will represent Region 7 in the Palarong Pambansa next year in Davao City. (RSC)