United States Olympic Committee
The United States Olympic Committee is a non-profit organization which serves the National Paralympic Committee and the National Olympic Committee for the United States. The organization also coordinates the work of various international sports federations, the world anti-doping agency and the United States Anti-Doping Agency. Even though the organization is chartered under the Title 36 of the United States Code, it does not receive any regular assistance from the federal funds. Therefore, it competes with other non-profit charitable institutes for sponsors.
The United States Olympic Committee is managed by a board of directors. There are about 10 members in this board that consist of executives from corporate America, people from various sports federations and former athletes who have participated in the Olympics.
The organization needs to solicit funds from time to time due to the fact that it is not supported by the government. Therefore the fund raising efforts need to be managed and initiated via public service announcements and direct solicitations. There is also some that comes in from the sales on the online store that the committee runs.
The United States Olympic Committee manages and operates various Olympic training centers. These are the places where aspiring Olympic athletes prepare for the competitions. The main facility is in Colorado in Colorado Springs. This is a place that offers training facilities for summer and winter sports. This is also the place for the headquarters of the United States Olympic Committee.
The ARCO training center is located in Chula Vista, California. There is a lake in the facility that helps in training in canoeing and rowing. There is also an Olympic center at Lake Placid in New York for inter sports including permanent facilities for ice hockey and figure skating. The Olympic rowing team practices at the US Olympic Rowing team Training Facility on Lake Mercer in Mercer County Central Park. Other than the training, the United States Olympic Committee also gives awards for the USOC Athlete of the Year, USOC Coach of the Year, USOC Olympic Hall of Fame and USOC Olympic Spirit Award.
Purpose
The stated mission statement of the United States Olympic Committee is "To support U.S. Olympic and Paralympic athletes in achieving sustained competitive excellence and preserve the Olympic principles, and thereby inspire all Americans." The culture of the committee is one that is full of commitment and creativity. The entire atmosphere of everything that the committee does has a competitive spirit to it.
The stories of various Olympic athletes inspire everyone who works in the organization. The vision of the organization is to allow every athlete in America to achieve the Olympic or Paralympic dream that they may have. This is done by providing the right environment for those who want to train in the various sports that are included in the Olympic.
The United States Olympic Committee is recognized by the Olympic Committee. This committee is considered to be the only entity that is involved in training athletes who are at the international level and entering and underwriting athletes for the Olympics. The committee does not provide facilities and training only for the Olympic athletes. It also has responsibility of spreading an overall environment of competitive sports across the country.
Since the main objective of the committee is to train American athletes to participate in the Olympics, they run and manage various training centers. These are the facilities where the sports people trains and prepare for the Olympics. The facilities are managed extremely professionally in order to provide the best training ground, best nutrition and best comforts to the athletes that are preparing to compete in the Olympic Games.
In order to promote and encourage various people participating in this movement, the committee also presents awards for the Athlete of the Year, Coach of the Year, Olympic Hall of Fame and Olympic Spirit Award. There are also various sub categories of these awards to include all genders and sports.
History
The United States Olympic Committee was a small group when it started. It was headed by James E. Sullivan and was known as the Amateur Athletic Union that was responsible for entering athletes into the Modern Olympic Games in Athens in 1896. The first president of the committee was Dr. William Milligan Sloane. The committee was formed formally in 1921 and was called the American Olympic Association.
The name of the organization was changed again in 1940 and it was called the United States of America Sports Federation. The name was changed again to United States Olympic Association in 1945. The organization was granted the Public Law 805 allowing it to solicit tax deductible contributions as a non-profit private association.
Some major constitutional revisions were done in 1961 and this was the time when the organization changed its name to the United States Olympic Committee too. And the headquarters of the committee were changed from New York to Colorado Springs in 1978. This was also the year when the Congress announced the association as the coordinating body for all athletes looking at participating in the Olympics and Pan America Games. In addition to that the committee was also given the responsibility of promoting fitness, sports and encouraging the development of sports and sports program.
The United States Olympic Committee also has the exclusive rights to the word "Olympic", "Olympiad" and "Citius, Altius Altius, Fortius". But if someone has been using the symbols and terminology before 1950, they are allowed to continue using the same.
The United States Olympic Committee Paralympic Division was created in 2001. This division helps in the preparation of athletes for the United States Paralympic Teams. They are responsible for sports education, sports programs and partnerships between sports organizations.
The United States Olympic Committee also launched an anti-steroid campaign with the Ad Council. This is a resurgence of the anti-steroid campaign that was launched as "Don't Be An Asterisk" in 2008.
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