ASAS Accreditation

Sport Ireland Accreditation for Student-Athlete Support (ASAS)

Sport Ireland published a new High-Performance Strategy in July 2021 alongside a key initiative to support dual career athletes.  The Accreditation for Student-Athlete Support (ASAS) is an accreditation recently developed and launched by Sport Ireland aimed at providing equal opportunity to all high-performing student-athletes to combine sport and education.

Creating a formal network of dual-career accredited institutes will enable a more effective, structured, and consistent system, benefiting the athletes, third-level institutes, and sports. ASAS is based on providing equal opportunity to all high-performing student-athletes to combine sport and education and is grounded in the right to education by applying guiding principles.

UCC Sport Performance Programme

The purpose of the UCC Sport performance programme is to support UCC teams and athletes to perform to their full potential. The programme is aimed at our sports scholarship students, our leading teams and athletes performing at top-level sports in Ireland and internationally. 

UCC has long been committed to the provision of an extensive and wide variety of sports and physical activity experiences. We have 55 recognised clubs with a combined membership of over 4,000 students, a dynamic student population driving and leading sport and the UCC clubs, supported by the Department of Sport and Physical Activity, the Clubs’ Executive and the Mardyke Arena. Our foundations are deep and strong and poised to expand with a long tradition of performing and winning in sports.

Context

High-performance athletes have unique demands in comparison to the non-student athlete population (e.g. increased time and energy demands, increased accountability to various support providers, international travel and competition requirements), and require flexible and supportive structures to successfully attain a dual career. Creating an environment that supports dual career athletes is a key success factor. A suitable dual-career environment requires understanding and consistent, structured support. Differences in the recognition and availability of dual career support within third-level institutes exist worldwide. Sport Ireland accreditation (ASAS) is the first of its kind in Ireland and provides an exciting opportunity to harmonize support structure and implement defined guiding principles.

Student-athlete standards and competition levels

UCC Sport recognises that students participate in a wide range of sporting and recreational activities.  

However, only a defined student-athlete population will be able to avail of exam and academic flexibility.

Student-athlete standards

To avail of the academic and exam flexibility service, student-athletes should be recognised as a high performance athletes by one of the following:

• Sport Ireland and Sport Ireland Institute
• A National Governing Body
• Players Association
• UCC Sport Scholarship and/or Sports Performance Programme