Athletes’ opinion of a dual career in Croatian secondary schools

Abstract

The purpose of this article is to present the Croatian dual career system (DC) and observe its implementation in secondary schools that provide DC special conditions and support. The participants of this study are 54 student-athletes (31 female and 23 male), who are representatives of three secondary schools that were partners in the project “Sinergy of Sports Culture, Olympic Value and DC for Young Athletes”, supported by the International Olympic Committee (IOC) and the European Olympic Committee (EOC) programs (2019). Despite the mandatory flexibility in education, 55.56% athletes confirmed that they had faced the problem of balancing between school and sports commitments. The majority of athletes (57.41%) trained every day, while 33.33% athletes trained several times a day. This study confirmed that student-athletes got most help and support on DC from family (83.33%) and coaches (9.26%). Monitoring the implementation of DC special conditions and support services designed specifically for athletes could be more successful.