Today we're happy to announce the launch of Skate Ukraine Academy – a platform for sharing knowledge and experience.

Skate Ukraine is aiming to unite the Ukrainian figure skating community. Its most valuable asset – our people and their experience and knowledge.

The way this knowledge is captured and shared defines our success. If no one shares what they know – we have no chance to evolve. Everybody has no choice but stuck on the same level, doing the same mistakes over and over. It often happens when people have zero-sum game thinking – in order to win, others have to lose.

But successful communities do not work like that. They require a switch to a positive-sum game thinking – the more successful people around you, the higher chance for you to succeed as well. Think about it for a moment. If you're a skater, would you prefer to be the only one, not having any successful rivals to compete with or you'd love to be among great talents that inspire you and motivate you to work harder and smarter? As a coach, would you prefer to be an only coach in Ukraine, or you'd love to be a part of a motivated talented coaching community, that you can build a great collaboration with or learn from?

We believe knowledge sharing is a necessity for Ukrainian figure skating to succeed. Skate Ukraine is an inherently positive-sum thinking organization. We strongly believe that the more successful each and one of us, the more successful we are all together. Plus, knowledge sharing builds trust and fosters collaboration.

Skate Ukraine Academy is one of the first steps to start building the knowledge and experience sharing culture in Ukrainian figure skating.  Everyone should have equal opportunities to learn from others. We want to give you freedom, tools, and support in your desire to help others become better.

This includes, but not limited to:

• online videos

• webinars

• offline events

• workshops

• seminars

• classes

• interviews with professionals

• etc.

The range of topics that you'll see in Skate Ukraine Academy is virtually unlimited. Whatever you feel might be important to learn for others – probably would be a good fit. This could be anything like:

• figure skating technique videos

• health and medicine related topics

• psychological and mental training

• ice rinks economics, building, and maintenance

• clubs management

• organizing or attending competitions

• finding your life after sports

• judging seminars

and many other topics.

One important disclaimer – many of you right now probably 100% sure that you have nothing to share. It's totally normal, we used to think that only Nobel laureates deserve to be heard, but we would try to convince you otherwise. Almost all of you have something to share. You don't have to be a world-renowned professional to help others. You don't even have to be a professional – sometimes just sharing your story, telling your experiences, and mistakes you've learned will save someone's career or even life. The power of knowledge sharing is incredible.

The rule of thumb – if you learned something, that you yourself from a year ago would benefit from – it's already a good topic to share with others. Don't let yourself stuck in a fear that there are people who know this better – it's always the case, and guess what – there are equally always people who know it less and would enjoy learning from you. We're here to help you go past your doubts and encourage you to share your skills and experience.

We're not only providing a platform to aggregate Skate Ukraine Academy projects but also helping you to bring them to life. We're going to help you to go from the initial idea, filled with doubts, to the actual high-quality content that is available to others through our website and social media.

Skate Ukraine Academy will be available at https://skateukraine.org/academy and our first project is coming in a few days.

Subscribe and follow us on social media, contact us through private messages or a public forum.

Stay tuned.