by Alyssa Hoying and Monica Velazquez-Stiak
We started off our day with a lecture and tour of one of the campuses of Charles University. Charles U was founded way back in 1348 and has a prestigious reputation throughout Europe. It has 17 different faculties which are their version of a college. What differs from American universities is that Charles’ faculties are spread out throughout the city and have very little cross over, meaning that you won’t take classes or have interaction with another faculty other than your own. The bachelor’s programs at Charles University typically take students three years to complete and some go on to do a two-year master’s program after that. What also differentiates from the American college structure is that their college education is FREE! The state universities in the Czech Republic are also more prestigious and harder to get into than their private universities. The specific college, or faculty, that we got to visit was their physical education, coaching, physical therapy, and sport management campus. This campus also trains students to be professional soldiers if they desire to study that!
If students decide to study physical education, they have to master every sport they will need to teach as a PE teacher. In the picture above, you’ll see some students preparing for their exams on track and field. Sports are separated by the year in school you’re in, so the students above are freshman since track and field is their first year sport. Each year the students will have a different sport to master and they will be tested on the basic rules of the sport and will have to be able to do the sport and getting a passing grade for it. The students in this faculty also take outdoor sport classes where they will have to travel to different areas in the Czech Republic to do sports like cross country skiing and white water rafting.
On this campus, they also have a gym very similar to the way the RPAC works at Ohio State. The gym is open to students who can get a pass for a very discounted rate. It is also open for the public to get a pass, where they will have access to cardio machines, squash courts, and an awesome rock wall! (We could only make it up so far in jeans and Birkenstock’s).
We also had the opportunity to talk with a class of first year sport management students at Charles University. Their classes for sport management were fairly similar to our sport industry major at Ohio State, but the students at Charles had to take a few more mathematics and economics courses than we do. From talking with the students, we learned how their college system does not really allow for students to be athletes simultaneously. There is no such thing as being a university student-athlete in the Czech Republic and they do not sponsor any sports teams or have any intramural teams in their faculties. Julie, one of the students we got to talk with, told us that she was a cross country skier and had to give it up so that she could go to college.
We learned a lot from the students and had a great time interacting with one another and learning about their lives, schooling, and career paths. We even got to teach them the ever famous O-H-I-O!
Our next stop on our busy day was to watch the Slavia Prague U17 soccer game. We got to the game right after the second half had started and to be honest, we weren’t quite sure what we were watching at first other than very athletic teenagers playing a great game of fútbol. However our trip planners and professors are always a step ahead of us and knew that our tour and lecture with a staff member from SK Slavia Prague would make the trip all make sense.
Coming up on our last stop of the day, we arrived at the Eden Arena – home of one of Prague’s professional soccer teams: SK Slavia Prague. The stadium was beautiful on the inside as we got to tour the facility and watch the rain fall on the field. We have been joking about how Europeans don’t mind taking the stairs up many flights, and as we moved throughout the stadium we were breaking a sweat and getting our workouts in for the day. Believe it or not… we climbed 21 flights today! Way to get our sweat on, Bucks!
The stadium holds 20,000 spectators and opened in 2010. Although the facility is rather new, the soccer club was founded in 1892 and has a strong history in the Czech Republic to this day. Something we were surprised by is that the team’s main sponsor is CFEC China, so we saw a lot of media creation and wall hangings in Chinese throughout the stadium. As we talked with Martin Hladik, he gave us more information on the youth academy the soccer team supports. In order to keep their rich history and elite players, they put a great amount of emphasis on training their future starts from a young age. The youth academy has 600 players and 30 coaches, funded by 1 million Euros a year to work their budget around. The academy works closely with the kid’s schools to make sure they can balance both training and getting their education. The cooperation with the schools and flexibility of schedules gives the Slavia Prague players all of the tools to pursue their dreams of being professional soccer players one day!
Well that’s all from Monica and Alyssa for Day #5 of our study abroad! We are off to explore the city some more in our evening free time and go on a boat tour with the group. Goodbye from Prague.