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1. Is it useful to put in place structures that can look after the children while the mother carries out the sport practice?
Having few time is one of the major causes of lower women practice of sport. For this reason, all those measures that decrease the time restrictions given by work and family and make it easy and uncomplicated for them to join in your sport is likely to increase women’s sport practice. If there are not the facilities to offer something like a crèche, mothers can be mobilised to share childcare.
As shared by the Sofia European Capital of Sport Foundation, sometimes offering childcare is not sufficient because mothers do not trust the person in charge of the childcare (students). For this reason, it is important to choose a person that can be “objectively” trusted. Besides this, placing the childcare near enough that mothers are able to see it and giving many details about the service can help mothers trusting the service and plan the activity inside their restricted time schedule.In what way from the public administration, federations or private entities can contribute to increase the percentage of women in the boards? (Do you know any specific action? …)
Federations have a crucial role to play in increasing the percentage of women in the boards. In fact they have major control many of the factors identified in the “Beyond 30%” report as the checklist for change:
1. Develop an effective recruitment and retention strategy which focuses on attracting diverse talent and nurtures it;
2. Promote a wide range of flexible working practices with the primary goal of attracting and retaining more women in the organisation, but which will benefit everyone;
3. Involve both women and men in achieving the shared goal of gender equality;
4. Challenge gender stereotypes;
5. Modernise organisational structures and practices to enable more women to rise up through the organisation. This includes reconsidering rigid elections by membership bodies.Public administrations also have an important role to play. They can ensure that gender issue is in the agenda of all the territorial actors, first among all sport, loisir and vocational organizations. How? By giving support and incentives to organizations that adopt gender-friendly measures and activities, by organizing transversal campaign and activities on gender issue, by inviting schools and all the entities working on career advice to include sport career in the range of careers opportunities presented to girls.
The increase of women in the clubs could also increase the figure of women in technical teams such as trainers and physical trainers? Do you think there is resistance in clubs to achieve a technical parity?
As the female dominated board in the female-dominated volleyball sport in Guimaraes shows, increasing the women in the clubs increase the possibilities of having women in the technical or managerial positions. Nonetheless, in an environment that has been dominated by patriarchal paradigma for centuries, an increase in the number of women practicing a sport is not enough alone to increase the number of women in power. The long-established pattern of choosing technical positions among men, the stereotypes on women’s skills and the lack of self-esteem that characterizes many women in male-dominated environment are just few of the many factors that hinders gender technical parity.
What is their role in bringing more awareness for women-friendly urban planning?
Women in executive positions can encourage the practice of outdoor activities, that allow women to take ownership of parks and public spaces. Walks where women are encouraged to identify the gender barriers to their use of the public spaces are key to accompany the process of ownership. Once the women feel entitled to use the public space and are aware of the barriers to optimally use it, the quest for more women-friendly public spaces will raise automatically by the women themselves. Inviting male’s members of participants’ families and network is also useful in order for men to become aware of the male-dominated environment and support the quest for women-friendly planning. As the “Beyond 30%” report states, “it is about creating environments that are diverse. Full stop. That will naturally draw women in.”
1. Can women in executive positions act as role models in their communities to encourage other women to do sports?
The hugely successful This Girl Can Campaign by Sport England identified that accessible role models were key. Nonetheless, historical and sociocultural associations between sport and masculinity still determine the predominance of male ‘sporting role models’ (SRMs) in many parts of the world.
Women in executive positions can have a great impact to address this situation. Their personal engagement can be inspiring for those women that are unconsciously reticent to practice sport in a male-dominated environment. Being aware of the power of persuasion deriving from being a woman in executive positions in the sport sector is crucial to release the potentialities of the position, that goes beyond the sport sector but empowers and give visibility to women skills in every sector.
Equally important, women in executive positions can redirect the priorities and resources of the sport institutions in the gender issues. For example, they can invite women to free trials for usually dominated male sports, they can make sure that equipment has the same quality for male and female dominated sports, they can organize championship, awards and events that attract attention and resources on female sport practitioners. They can promote instructions and signals that are gender neutral. For example, the instructions and exercises for sport machines should be on the base of physical characteristics such as weight, height and resistance rather than on gender. Baby changing tables and the relative signals should be both on women and men toilets.
Finally, they can share their experience and information with girls that are talented and willing to purse job positions in the sport sector. For this reason, formal and informal mentor opportunities can be organized in order to “help them transition when taking on bigger responsibilities such as managing a team or as a way of providing guidance on how to work through problems or deal with difficult situations”.
– What are your good examples that can be applied by the local municipality?
We answer this question by sharing the recommendations that the “Active girls and women strategy” report suggests in order to increase women and girls’ involvement in sport or physical activity in the municipality of Ballarat, in Australia:
• Conduct and monitor research on structured and unstructured physical activity and participation rates for women and girls across the region, particularly activities likely to be popular with women such as walking, netball, aerobics/ group fitness/gym activities, cycling, swimming, running, yoga, dance, tennis and soccer
• Work with universities and sports associations to explore possible opportunities and actions required to improve sport pathways for women and girls
• Support women’s and girls’ sport participation initiatives
• Support local competitions and physical activity events targeting women and girls.
• Identify opportunities to partner with organisations that delivery female physical activity programs or initiatives
• Explore opportunities to work with community groups and other relevant service providers or agencies to facilitate opportunities for low cost, social physical activity options these may include running or walking groups, football, basketball etc
• Develop a series of walking, running and cycling maps of the Municipality to promote opportunities for local participation
• Develop a strategy around family-friendly activities. This will include promoting general play spaces as free family-friendly exercise and active participation opportunities.The whole report can be read at this link: http://www.ballarat.vic.gov.au/media/4455763/2018_active_women_and_girls_strategy.pdf
– Who can be the partners / stakeholders of the local administration and civil society in order to increase the women involvement in sport field?
Gyms, sport clubs and sport associations are a key actor to increase women involvement in the sport field. Their reach, network and marketing capacity are a key tool if redirected towards women participation in sport. Also loisir association not having sport in their core mission can be an important channel to reach women that are far from sport environment. Other two crucial actors, usually neglected in main policies, are women’s employer and women’s partners. Working and domestic environments that are aware of the importance of sport activity can significantly decrease the time burden that prevent many women from practicing a sport.
Last but not least, developing synergies with the health sector would allow to develop campaign raising awareness of the benefits of an active life.– What kind of policies do you feel needed in order to increase the women involvement in local sport field?
Policies that help reduce the lack of time that women with family often experience could be key to increase women involvement in local sports. For example, policies that raise awareness on the bigger load that women usually experience in house activities besides their main profession, or policies increasing the working flexibility of women with children would help women to have more free time to devote to sport activities.
We also wish a policy that encourages sport practices that are fair and help to develop the critical thinking and independence of women. This means sports played with high ethical standards and with a holistic view on the physical as much as intellectual/psychological development of the sport practitioner. In this way sport could express its best potentialities also in term of inclusion of women in the social and political life.
– Which will be the most important infrastructure investments that you consider fundamental in order to restart the mass sport framework at local level, with an impact on women involvement?
One of the possibilities is to embed the sport space in a larger hybrid space that gathers simultaneously several functions dedicated to local community, where people can gather not only to do sport, but also to drink a coffee, celebrate a birthday, attend a community meeting, borrow a book or prepare a meal together. These multifunctional spaces have a long tradition in the US. Palo Verde Library and Maryvale Community Centre is a good example of a multifunctional ensemble. Besides the sportive community centre, it offers a library, an auditorium, a ballroom and loisir spaces for juniors and seniors https://www.archdaily.com/102240/palo-verde-library-and-maryvale-community-center-gould-evans
How would you like to be supported by the local municipality in order to increase your involvement in mass sport?
In order to increase women involvement in mass sport, it is essential to make sport an easy option. This means that the sport offer should be economically affordable, easily reachable, attractive and providing extra benefits besides the sport activity (socializing moment, relieve stress, etc.).
There are many measures a municipality can tackle in order to meet these objectives. To make sport activities economically affordable, the municipality can use part of the incomes deriving from the rental of public structures to provide incentives for sport practitioners (for example through a point system that reward participants with money, sport equipment or discount in shops when they attended 10 sessions in less than 2 months). By using local suppliers as a venue to spend these incentives, the municipality will also attract more acceptance and consensus by the local community around the sport incentives and more generally around the sport practice.
To make sport easily reachable, municipality can encourage schools and actors owning large spaces to equip them for sport activities and open them to the general public in those part of the days that they are not used for their main purpose. Parks can also be equipped and managed in a way to increase the security perception and increase the availability of easy to reach sport grounds.
To make sport more attractive and meeting different needs of the citizens, the municipality can encourage sport space’s managers to organize special sport events and dedicate a part of the gym to a hybrid space like cafes or lounges, where people can socialize. Municipality can encourage this both through supportive regulations/ urban plans and through support for the organization of the activities and the maintenance of the spaces.
in reply to: Planning for disabilities #801Author: Play by the rules
Title: People with disabilities
Abstract: Little review of the barriers, conditions and actions to include disable people in sport activities.
Link: https://www.playbytherules.net.au/got-an-issue/inclusion-and-diversity/inclusion-and-diversity-what-can-you-do/people-with-disabilityin reply to: Planning for disabilities #800Author: CBM
Title: The 3P’s for inclusion of women with disabilities: The Personal, The Political, The Policy
Abstract: The document collects the analysis on the conditions of women with disabilities and provides recommendations and statements on the topic.
Link: https://www.cbm.org/article/downloads/54741/The_Personal__The_Political__The_Policy.pdfin reply to: A child friendly approach #799Author: Legacy of 2002 World Conference on Women and Sport
Title: The Montreal toolkit
Abstract: It is a reference manual that contains 20 tools to help delegates in their challenges to bring about change in their own community, organisation, region, or nation.
https://www.icsspe.org/system/files/2002%20World%20Conference%20on%20Women%20and%20Sport%20-%20Montreal%20Toolkit.pdfin reply to: A child friendly approach #798Author: United Nations
Women and sport
Abstract: The report explores the relationship between sport and gender equality. It reviews the United Nations human rights and sport for development and peace framework as well as global and regional policy/normative frameworks on women, gender equality and sports. It examines the ways in which sport serves as a vehicle for gender equality and the empowerment of women and girls, and then focuses on addressing gender inequalities in sport. The last part of this publication draws conclusions and offers recommendations.
http://www.un.org/womenwatch/daw/public/Women%20and%20Sport.pdfAuthor: Kristy Howells, Laura Gubby, Katie Dray, Hayley Mills.
Title: WE NEED MORE FEMALE ROLE MODELS IN SPORT TO INSPIRE THE NEXT GENERATION
Abstract: The articles provides facts about the early drop of interest in sport among girls and provides recommendations on how to keep girls also after 7 years old. -
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