The FIG Academy Program consists of three levels of coaches' education. Federations may enter at a level that reflects their own specific gymnastics coaching education programs. Thus, federations with no gymnastics coaching education or only occasional coaching clinics must begin at Level 1. Those with formal coaching education programs may begin at Level 2. Those with formal university degree programs specifically for gymnastics coaches may begin at Level 3.

Additional high performance prerequisites and high examination results may qualify successful coaches for an FIG Coaches' Brevet. Successful completion of a Level 3 Academy and/or an FIG Coaches' Brevet is one of the requirements for future candidates for positions on any of the FIG Technical Committees.

The curriculum for each of the FIG Academy Levels includes between 8 and 10 theory lectures such as biomechanics, anatomy, psychology, planning, training theory, physiology, and sport theory. Each of these lectures has been prepared and focused to meet the specific needs of gymnastics coaches. In addition there are extensive in-gym technical sessions on all pieces of apparatus as well as in choreography and physical and artistic preparation.

Each level of the FIG Academy Program is supplemented with additional resource booklets in all of the sport sciences, technical manuals that include scientific understanding and methodology on each skill taught on each apparatus, and video-tapes of all skills that are presented. The Academy courses are of seven-day duration and conclude with a comprehensive theoretical and practical examination.

The FIG does not certify or license coaches. That is specifically the responsibility of each federation. The FIG will provide the examination results to the federation of each participating coach and then the federation must decide what status those results will confer on its coaches.

This three-level FIG Academy Program has a high performance orientation and has been supplemented, in cooperation with the FIG Gymnastics for All Committee, with a cross-discipline "Foundation of Gymnastics" that will serve as the basis and perhaps a prerequisite for entry into the Academy Program. A Gymnastics Management course that is aimed at federations which are at the beginnings of establishing organized gymnastics programs in their countries is also near to completion.

By the end of 2008, some 55 FIG Academies for all disciplines but Acrobatic Gymnastics (first Acrobatics Academy is planned for January 2009) will have been held in 31 countries with nearly 1000 different participants from about 90 federations. The FIG Brevet will have been conferred on approximately 180 coaches from 50 federations. Based on available financial and human resources, approximately 20-25 Academies are being planned annually for the six FIG disciplines over each of the next few years.

Because the FIG cannot hope to teach all coaches in all countries, the FIG Academy Program and all the curriculum materials can be licensed to larger federations which have many hundreds or many thousands of coaches. In this way the FIG Academy content can become a significant part of their coaches' education program and can be taught by the federations' own experts. The details for this option have not yet been finalized.