Name John Bloomfield | Role Author | |
Books Australia's Sporting Success: The Inside Story | ||
John Bloomfield AM (born 12 December 1932) is an Australian sport and human movement academic and author. Bloomfield played a significant role in the development of the Australian high performance sport system between 1973 and 1989, particularly in relation to the Australian Institute of Sport.
Contents
Personal
Bloomfield was born on 12 December 1932. In 1959, he married Noelene Watt and they have two sons and one daughter. He grew up in the Wollongong, New South Wales area and attended Wollongong High School, Sydney Teacher's College and the University of Oregon.
University
Bloomfield left Australia in 1960 on a Fulbright Scholarship to undertake post graduate studies at the University of Oregon. In 1968 he was awarded a PhD at the University of Oregon and returned to the University of Western Australia to head up its new physical education program. In 1974, he became the foundation professor at the Department of Human Movement at the University of Western Australia. He became Australia's first professor specialising in sport and human movement. Due to this experience, Bloomfield has advised twelve Australian universities in regard to establishing human movement degrees. Bloomfield has authored or co-authored over 100 national or international scientific papers and book chapters and is the author of several major books and reports on sport. In 1997, he was made emeritus professor at the University of Western Australia. Since 2002, he has been honorary professor at the University of Notre Dame.
Sport
Bloomfield grew up in Wollongong and became a successful surf life saver. In 1951/1952, he won the branch, state and Australian Junior Belt Championship and represented Australia several times in the 1950s. He wrote a book titled Know How to Surf. In 1972, the Whitlam Government commissioned him to prepare a white paper on Australia sport. The white paper titled Role and scope and development of recreation in Australia was influential in the case for establishing the Australian Institute of Sport (AIS) in 1981. He prepared two reports that lead to the establishment of the Western Australian Department of Sport and Western Australian Institute of Sport.
In 1980, he was appointed deputy chairman of the newly established Australian Institute of Sport and in 1985 replaced Kevan Gosper as chairman, a position which he held until 1989. Whilst chairman, he was involved in managing the merger of the AIS with the Australian Sports Commission and responding to the allegations of the Senate inquiry into drugs in sport. He was co-chairman of the Australian Sports Commission with Ted Harris during the merger period 1987 and 1989. In 2003, he authored the book Australia's Sporting Success: The Inside Story, the first attempt to document the development high performance sport in Australia.
Between 1971 and 1973, he was president of the Australian Sports Medicine Federation now Sports Medicine Australia. He was chairman of the Western Australian Institute of Sport Advisory Board (1980–1982), Western Australian Sports Centre Trust (1986–1989) and Australian Sports Science Council (1983–1986).
Publications
Bloomfield has authored several significant books and reports on sport.