NEWS
The second transnational meeting of the European Para-Limits project (https://paralimits.eu) was held at the Foro Italico University in Rome on December 16, 2021. During the meeting, the progress of the collection of the eminence-base knowledge collected through an international survey was presented and further activities were envisioned. The partners also agreed on the deadlines for the next tasks and on the steps to present the findings. In particular, it was envisioned to disseminate the project and the outcomes of its activities at the 2022 Annual EAS Conference to be held at the Catholic University of Murcia (UCAM) in Cartagena, Spain. On 30-31 May and 1 June, 2022, the next transnational meeting will be held at the University of Limerick, Ireland. Despite the challenges of the COVID-19 pandemic, during the first months of the project the partners recognized their enthusiastic commitment in accomplishing the preliminary phases of Para-Limits and they were very satisfied by the great work carried out.
On December 10, 2021, the fifth virtual EAS cafè addressed the support of dual career high school athletes especially during the critical pandemic situation. Masar Gjaka, winner of the 2018 Bengt Nybelius award and currently Dean of the Faculty of Sport and Movement Science, UBT College, Pristina, Kosovo, moderated the event, which offered Italian, Slovenian, and Danish approaches and experiences, as well as an opportunity to envisage future actions and visions in dual career of talented athletes.
Paola Deiana, Director of the Office V, Italian Ministry of Education, presented the development of the experimental dual career high school programme, which was introduced in 2015 and currently involves more than 1500 schools, 5000 tutors, and 14000 athletes meeting the requirements established by the Italian Olympic Committee, Italian Paralympic Committee and the Italian Sports Federations. Despite its positive trend, this programme involves a lower number of female athletes with respect to male athletes and a low percentage of Paralympic athletes with respect to their Olympic counterparts. Paola Deiana anticipated that the Italian Ministry of Education is envisaging an extension of the programme to all the Italian schools, from the primary schools to the universities, and an equity for gender and capabilities. Furthermore, she highlighted the need of an innovative educational approach, which should be effective in providing knowledge with a reduced live-teaching time and encompassing sports issues in the different topics of high school curricula.
Jožef Križaj, Assistant Professor and Head of the Postgraduate Doctoral Studies Department at the Faculty of Sport University of Ljubljana, Slovenia, gave a contribution as a researcher and as a parent supporting the dual career of elite youth athletes. He illustrated the dual career programme at the Slovenian high schools and presented some challenges youth athletes faced during the COVID-19 lockdown. In particular, he disclosed the results of a national research, which highlighted differences between athletes of individual and team sports, the latter suffering more the negative effects of lockdown for missing group training sessions and weekly competitions. Jožef Križaj urged particular attention to adolescent athletes to prevent pandemic-related sport dropouts and to sustain a proper development of sport skills during the post-pandemic time. This concern is especially evident after the past two years and can heavily affect the sports system in a near future.
Ole Keldorf, Head of Sport at the prestigious Elite Sports Academy of Aarhus (ESAA), Denmark, and member of the EAS Executive Board, gave a precious contribution to the debate in presenting the pandemic-related critical aspects observed in Danish youth athletes. Data from the ESAA observatory suggest that dual career actors should place particular attention to the talented youth athletes’ perception and attitudes towards sports, life, and wellbeing. He claimed that the European dual career culture should consider particularly relevant the mental health of youth athletes and offered the ESAA survey as a valuable example of dual career best practice for monitoring the wellbeing of athletes as students. In fact, the systematic collection of athletes’ perceptions regarding their sports enjoyment, recovery, and social aspects could be crucial not only to prevent sport disengagement and dropouts but also to foreseeing new avenues for sport development. Ole Keldorf also called for a cooperation between countries to share possible solutions to the challenges posed by this pandemic situation.
In considering the call for the Next Decade of European Education through a cooperation between educational institutions in different countries (https://ec.europa.eu/education/summit/next-decade-european-education_en ), members of the EAS community were invited to be proactive in establishing innovative collaborative partnerships in dual career for high school athletes.
The fifth EAS Virtual Cafè attracted around 60 European dual career experts and will come back on February 2022.
On December 2, 2021, the Associació Esportiva Carles Vallbona (AECV, coordinator) hosted the final event of the European Collaborative Partnership “Dual Career for Women Athletes” (DONA), which aimed to support dual career of talented female athletes in cooperation with Phoenix Sport Club (PSC), Scuola di Pallavolo Anderlini Soc. Coop. Sociale SD (SPA), Istres Provence Volley (IPV), De SportMaatschappij Foundation (DSM), University of Ljubljana (UL), and the European Athlete as Student (EAS) network (EAS). Despite the COVID-19 pandemic, DONA succeeded in offering a pilot programme on female athletes’ Dual Career competences (i.e., monitoring and evaluation toolkit) at the level of volleyball clubs.
Joan Carles Marín, project coordinator, opened the face-to-face conference and welcomed 200 participants.
Leonard Zammit (Phoenix Sport Club) illustrated the aims, development, and outcomes of the project. In particular, she stressed the DONA methodology for successfully approaching and enhancing female athletes’ Dual Careers, which encompassed quantitative and qualitative analyses.
Federica Stradi (Scuola di Pallavolo Anderlini Soc. Coop. Sociale SD) presented five steps for implementing Dual Career at a volleyball club level, encompassing Coordinator and Dual Career Club Management Team, Philosophy, Communication, Implementation and Monitoring. In considering that the COVID pandemic affected the time management, goal setting and identity of athletes, Noemí Bonet (psychologist of AECV) and Joan Carles Marín (President of AECV) presented the impact of the DONA project and offered ideas for the future.
Moderated by TV3 journalist Jordi Sanuy, Ona Carbonell (synchronized swimming Olympic medalist), Aina Berbel (international player at CV Sant Cugat), Maribel Zamora (President of the Catalan Volleyball Federation), Anna González (mother of a volleyball player) and Gloria Montoy (education inspector) discussed in round table Dual Career of female athletes.
The Italian Olympic Committee hosted the final event of the Sport Opens School
On November 23, 2021, the Italian Olympic Committee hosted in the prestigious Sala d’Onore of Foro Italico the final event of the European Collaborative partnership Sports Opens School (SOS). Due to COVID-19 restriction, the event was organized in a blended modality with around 70 participants face-to-face and more than 100 booked for the online modality.
During its lifetime, the eight partners of SOS (Centro Universitario Sportivo, CUS Padova – ITA,
Comitato Olimpico Nazionale Italiano, CONI – ITA, Inspectoratul Școlar Județean Bacău – ROM, Instituto N.ª Sra. da Encarnação – Cooperativa de Ensino, ECB – POR, Istituto di Istruzione Superiore ‘Newton-Pertini’ – ITA, Budapest VI. Kerületi Kölcsey Ferenc Gimnázium, KFG – HUN, and the European Athlete as Student Network – MLT) cooperated to develop a new teaching method for high school physical education teachers.
Dr. Marco Arpino and Dr. Jacopo Tognon (CONI) opened the conference and Mr. Riccardo Garavello (CUS Padova) welcomed the participants of CUS Padova. Dr. Paola Deiana (Office V, Italian Ministry of Education) stressed the relevant role of physical education for the holistic development of young students and supported new approaches of school physical education to enhance active lifestyles and the sport culture.
Marianna Pavan (CUS Padova), Laura Capranica (EAS), Laura Brazzarola (CUS Padova), and André Luís (ECB) illustrated the project’s aims, development, and outcomes. In particular, the initial phase of SOS encompassed research updates on three main areas Physical Activity and Health; Fairplay and Integrity; Life and Employability Skills. Furthermore, school coordinators provided an overview of the specific situation of each partner school. This narrative research allowed to create the 15 SOS Physical Education teaching sheets and teaching units, translated in English, Hungarian, Italian, Portuguese, and Romanian. Following the analysis of data collected during a monitoring phase, the SOS toolkit is now available to be used at high school levels as a part of the traditional PE curriculum (https://www.sportopensschool.eu).
Finally, Antoni Balàsz (KFG) offered the opinions of the students participating in the project and Marta Gravina (CUS Padova) presented the closing remarks.
Dear Dual Career Friends and Colleagues,
2021 has not been an easy year, with ongoing pandemic waves and proliferation of new COVID variants affecting our life. Despite the restrictions, EAS strengthened its efforts in Dual Career by consolidating virtual cafes to discuss stories and visions with experts, participating in activities of several European Collaborative Partnerships, contributing to online European consultations, organizing the Annual Conference in Lisbon, 2021 European Capital of Sport, in a blended modality, and awarding the 2020 and 2021 Bengt Nybelius Scholarships.
Discussions on “Dual Career of migrating athletes”, “media role in the promotion of the European Dual Career culture”, “implementing Dual Career policies and provisions at university level”, and “well-being and mental health for Dual Career athletes at high school level” have been the topic of the 2021 EAS virtual cafè. All of us are invited to propose Dual Career topics to be addressed in 2022.
During this challenging year four Collaborative Partnerships have been finalized with outstanding outcomes, encompassing the More Than Gold guidelines for implementing Dual Career at higher education institutions, the EMPATIA online and multilingual educational programme for parents of Dual Career athletes, the EdMedia online educational programme and guidelines to enhance the visibility of Dual Career athletes, the SportOpensSchool multilingual teaching method for high school physical education teachers. Furthermore, EAS also contributed to the dissemination of knowledge gathered in Dual Career projects, which were published in five peer-review journals and submitted for further three publications. Even though the COVID-related restrictions heavily challenged the ongoing BRAVA-DC, EL-CAMP, PARA-LIMITS and STARTING11 Dual Career projects, their activities are proceeding. Finally, our Network participated in applications to the ERASMUS+ Sport 2021 Call for Collaborative Partnerships on Dual Career, hopefully to be started in 2022.
During the past months EAS contributed to the consultations on the sports policies at the European level, supporting the role of education in and through sport and proposing to extend Dual Career to sport staff (e.g., coaches, physical trainers, referees, and sport managers). Furthermore, EAS contributed to the debate for the revision of the European Sport Charter and the online events organized by the Bureau of the Consultative Committee of EPAS-Council of Europe.
Thanks to the courage, efforts, and hard work of the Organizing Committee of the University Institute of Lisbon several members attended in presence the 2021 annual conference, renovating friendship and establishing new collaborations. Furthermore, to keep a strong relationship with those who were still restricted in their travelling due to COVID-19, an online option was made available. During the General Assembly, Antonio Sanchez-Pato, Dean of the Faculty of Sport at UCAM, was elected member of the Executive Board in replacement of Joerg Foerster, who resigned his position due to a new prestigious career progression. Having appreciated Joerg’s dedication to EAS since its very beginning, all of us wish to keep collaborating with him whenever possible for the benefit of the holistic development of athletes. Meantime, the wide experience and commitment of Antonio to Dual Career are the guarantee for further advancement of our network and a successful 19th EAS Annual Conference to be organized by UCAM in Cartagena, Spain, in 2022. Finally, the EAS Executive Board appointed Ole Keldorf, Head of Sport ESAA, as Secretary General in recognition of his efforts to the European dual career network.
The holiday season is here and with it the end of 2021. We take this opportunity to celebrate hope and faith for a better future. Together, we will continue disseminating the European Dual Career culture at local, national and international levels for the benefit of athletes as students. We also remind you to renew your 2022 EAS membership through the link http://www.dualcareer.eu/membership/.
In embracing the joy and traditions of the holiday season, the Executive Board of EAS wishes you and your family a full restart in 2022.
During the 2021 edition of the event JOB&Orienta focused on schools and jobs (JOB&Orienta), on November 25, the Italian Ministry of Education organized the Dual Career event “Experimental project elite high school student-athlete: Job orienteering in and through sport”, offering a precious opportunity to debate the latest policies and programmes for the implementation of effective alliances between institutions and stakeholders, as well as providing useful and practical guidance for youth and families on dual career opportunities.
Dr. Paola Deiana and dr. Fabio Saverio Romito (Italian Ministry of Education) welcomed the participants, and Prof, Federica Pilotti moderated the lectures, which addressed the added value of individualized dual career (Prof. Immacolata Messuri, Telematic University IUL), the cultural challenge of dual career (Prof. Chiara D’Angelo, Catholic University of Milan), and the translation of European policies into practices (Prof. Laura Capranica, EAS). Furthermore, Ambra Sabatini (2021 Paralympic gold medal 100m dash) and Zeno Martini (international athlete of rafting) presented the student-athlete’s voices.
JOB&Orienta represented a tremendous opportunity to disseminate the outcomes of the EMPATIA and EdMedia Collaborative partnerships and the platform to help parents/tutors in supporting dual career athletes and student-athletes to increase their visibility as role models for talented athletes.
Dear friends of dual career,
On behalf of the EAS Executive Committee I would like to inform you that the fifth EAS Virtual Cafè on “Well-being and mental health for Dual Career athletes at high School level” will be held on December 10, 2021 (from 12:00 CET).
In particular, Dr. Paola Deiana (Director Office V Italian Ministry of Education), Dr. Jožef Križaj (Faculty of Sport, University of Ljubljana) and Ole Keldorf (Head of Sport at Elite Sports Academy Aarhus) will illustrate the Italian, Slovenian, and Danish approach to dual career at high school level, and will present their observations and concerns on well-being and mental health of the student-athletes during and after COVID pandemic.
Dr. Masar Gjaka (Dean of the Faculty of Sport and Movement Science, UBT College, Pristina, Kosovo) will moderate the event.
You can Join Zoom Meeting
https://uni-lj-si.zoom.us/j/96295261510
Meeting ID: 962 9526 1510
Should you have any additional requests or questions, feel free to contact me.
Best,
Laura Capranica
Professor
EAS president
On November 23, 2021 The European Parliament approved its resolution on EU sports policy: Assessment and possible ways forward (2021/2058(INI)) – Link
Dual career was maintained in the EU priorities and extended to all the sport staff (coaches, referees, sport managers) as reported I the following points:
- Calls for the EU guidelines on dual careers of athletes to be implemented and promoted in each Member State, and extended to all sport staff engaged in structured sport and for specific retraining initiatives;
- Reiterates its call on the Commission, the Member States, sports federations and clubs to promote dual-career opportunities for athletes and calls on the Commission to consider including cross-border mobility of athletes in the next Erasmus+ programme;
- Reiterates the need to develop a strategy for supporting former athletes to ensure they have adequate access to jobs, skilling or reskilling.
Furthermore, the 2022 annual work programme – “Erasmus+”: the Union Programme for 
Education, Training, Youth and Sport has been published (https://erasmus-plus.ec.europa.eu/document/2022-annual-work-programme-erasmus-the-union-programme-for-education-training-youth-and-sport). In particular, it will also promote and support good governance in sport and dual careers of athletes and voluntary activities in sport, together with social inclusion, including of refugees and migrants. The implementation of the Erasmus+ sport actions will continue to assist sporting organisations and clubs to recover from the COVID-19 crisis. Continuity will be ensured in the support of the European Week of Sport and the implementation of EU guidelines (EU Physical Activity Guidelines and EU Guidelines on Dual Careers of Athletes).
Important deadlines:
Small-scale partnerships in the field of sport: 23 March
Cooperation partnerships in the field of sport: 23 March
Non-for-profit European Sport Events: 23 March
Capacity building in the field of Sport: 7 April
EAS will support new applications for the further development of the European Dual Career Discourse!
Partners of the project Education Model for Parents of Athletes in Academics (EMPATIA) met on October 29 in person in Rome, with some partners attending also online, reviewing the main project outcomes and setting the final tasks before the project officially concludes the end of November.
EMPATIA offers an educational platform for parents and guardians of athletes in education. Useful resource materials are offered within the online education modules in multiple languages and are available through the official website of the project.
Apart of the resources also three academic research papers have been published:
https://doi.org/10.1016/j.psychsport.2020.101833
https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0243354
https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0257719
The project has been presented and disseminated by project partners across Europe, and also beyond.
At the final meeting all the work packages have been presented and analysed, each partner presented their activities.
The EMPATIA project is co-funded by the Erasmus+ Programme of the European Union, led by the University of Ljubljana. The consortium is composed of 10 partners, representing universities, institutes and sports bodies from four countries and two European networks,
For more information, please see www.empatiasport.eu
On October 21-23, 202, ENGSO organized the European Sport Platform in Vilnius, Lithuania. The first day of the event was dedicated to the results of the EU-funded project CHAMP, which was dedicated to the innovation and modernization of sport clubs and sports movements.
The morning of the second day was dedicated to EU policies for sport, with particular focus on building inclusive process, including presentations by Stefan Bergh, ENGSO President, Diana Reklaitiene, Lithuanian Sport University Rector, Darius Saluga, Lithuanian Union of Sport Federations President, and Florencia Van Houdt, Head of the Unit for Sport at the European Commission.
The afternoon was dedicated to workshops focused on Evidence for impact – how grassroots sports can use research more efficiently? – Equality in Sport – Change that Inspires Change – and Dual Career: from policy to practice.
Moderated by Agne Vanagiene, Lithuanian National Olympic Committee, the keynote speaker of the dual career workshop, Laura Capranica – EAS President, reported the recent progress of the European discourse on dual career and the outcomes of the recently finalized EU-funded projects: “AMID – Athletic Migration in Dual Career”, coordinated by the University of Salzburg, Austria (https://blogi.eoppimispalvelut.fi/amid/) and “Ed Media – Media as a channel of Athletes’ Dual Careers promotion and education”, coordinated by the Lietuvos Sporto Universitetas of Kaunas, Lithuania (https://www.lsu.lt/en/project-edmedia/); the EU-funded approaching the finish line: “EMPATIA – Education Model for Parents of AThlete in Academics”, coordinated by the University of Ljubljana, Slovenia (https://www.empatiasport.eu); “More than Gold”, coordinated by the University of Latvia (https://morethangold.eu); “DONA – Dual Career for wOmeN Athlete”, coordinated by the Associació Esportiva Carles Vallbona, Spain; “SOS – Sport Opens Schools”, coordinated by the Centro Universitario Sportivo di Padova, Italy (https://www.sportopensschool.eu); “STARTING11”, coordinated by Amsterdam University of Applied Sciences, The Netherlands (https://starting11.eu); and the ongoing projects: “Para-Limits”, coordinated by the Universitad Catolica de Murcia – UCAM, Spain (https://paralimits.eu); “ELCAMP A Self-employment Career Option for Elite Athletes: Innovative Sport-focused Entrepreneurship Bootcamp”, coordinated by Collective Innovation AS (COLLINN), Norway; and BRAVA-DC – BRAnd Value Alignment through Dual Career, coordinated by the University of Limerick, Ireland. In particular, the already available dual career educational platforms of EdMedia (https://www.lsu.lt/en/project-edmedia/edmedia-online-platform/); and EMPATIA (https://edu.empatiasport.eu/eng/) were presented, as well the new frontiers of a dual career extended to sportspersons (e.g., coaches, referees, and sports managers) and the development of dual career monitoring.
Inga Staskeviciute Butiene, Associate Professor at the Lithuanian Sports University, presented the Lithuanian dual career observatory and the follow-up findings of the EdMedia project, including the evolution of a dual career in Lithuania. Wolfgang Stockinger, TW1N CEO (Austria), illustrated the activities of the programme RESPECT YOUR TALENT, which promotes the holistic development of talented players’ careers on and off the handball court. Finally, the Olympic athlete specialized in walking and sports journalist Brigita Virbalytė-Dimšienė offered her experience regarding the difficulties and barriers dual career employee-athletes encounter in balancing their working and sports commitments.
The last day of the event encompassed the workshop “Sustainability in and through Sport – Air Quality (air quality issues that impact global sport”, including presentations by Paolo Emilio Adami – Medical Manager – Health and Science Department at World Athletic, Niki Koutrou, Bournemouth University, UK, and EU funded PlayGreen project, and Ivana Pranjic, ENGSO. Finally, Yves Le Lostecque, Head of Erasmus Mundus & Sport Unit – EACEA presented “Capacity building: Next funding program for sport”
Stefan Bergh, ENGSO President, and Sara Massini, ENGSO Secretary General closed the event and announced that the next European Sport Forum will be in the Netherlands.
REG. NUMBER: Voluntary Organisation registration VO/1270
PIC NUMBER: 913459865
Email: info@dualcareer.eu