PROJECTS / DOCUMENTS
On December 21, 2020 a virtual meeting of the EMPATIA Team was organized. The coordinator, Prof. Mojca Doupona informed that the project has been extended to the end of November 2021, which will allow to organize onsite workshops with parents of dual career athletes and the final conference of the project.
At present, the EMPATIA Educational Programme for parents has been developed on the evidence- and eminence-based knowledge, which has been published on relevant international peer-review journals. In particular, a systematic literature review on Parents about parenting dual career athletes is available at the Psychology of Sport and Exercise and the parents’ view for understanding the educational needs of parenting athletes involved in sport and education will be published on PlosOne. Furthermore, the manuscript on the European framework of parenting dual career athletes is currently under revision.
On November 30, 2020, EAS welcomed 101 participants of the first virtual EAS café on parenting dual career athletes, well moderated by Paolo Bouquet, President of the Unisport-Italia network.
Originating from the findings of the FISU-EAS survey during the 2017 Summer Universiade and of the EU-funded ERASMUS+Sport Collaborative Partnership Education Model for Parents of Athletes In Academics (EMPATIA, 2018-2020), and the experience of Unisport-Italia during the COVID-19 lockdown, the event addressed the relevant role of parents in support of their talented child.
Kole Gjeloshaj, Deputy Secretary General of the International School Sport Federation (ISF) and Chair of the Consultative Committee of EPAS-Council of Europe recognized the relevant role of parents in supporting the holistic development of youth athletes and during the ISF events. After having illustrated the main documents of the International Olympic Committee, the Council of Europe, and UNESCO that consider parents/family important actors of the athlete’s supportive entourage, he highlighted the need of a structured recognition and integration of parents in the actions and policies of sports organizations, as well as future studies on the parents’ perception, involvement and experience before and after a multi-sport event.
Mojca Doupona, General Director for Sport of the Ministry for education, science and sport in Slovenia, offered her personal experience as a former elite handball player, university professor, and mother of former student-athlete. After providing a thorough representation of the challenge parents face in supporting their talented child, she presented a video contribution of her daughter Tajda. The latter has been an elite swimmer and currently is a student of medicine. In presenting her personal experience, Tajda effectively summarized many relevant aspects of the parental support to the dual career of their child often acting as the link between the teachers and the coaches, envisaging a specific educational programme for helping parents in their difficult role.
Kairis Ulp, policy officer at the Sports Office of the European Commission, ensured that the European Union in its Work Plan for Sport 2021-2024 will continue considering education through and in sports relevant, as well as the contribution of the stakeholders in the development of the European sports culture. She also contributed to debate the issues that participants presented to the speakers.
Paolo Bouquet summarized the outcomes of the café and envisaged the organization of future “EAS café” to discuss specific aspects of dual career.
PROGRAMME
12:00 Welcome
Mojca Doupona
EAS Treasurer and Coordinator of the European project Education Model for Parents of AThletes In Academics (EMPATIA)
Paolo Bouquet
President of the UNSPORT Italia Network and organizer of its virtual café
12:15 The Challenges of Parenting Elite Student-Athletes
MARCO ARPINO – General Affairs Manager of the Italian Olympic Committee. Former elite Italian fencer in three Olympic Games (Seoul 1988, Barcelona 1992, Atlanta 1996), gold medal at the World Championships in Athens 1994 and the Universiade in Sheffield 1991. His education includes degrees in law, political science, social science, police science, the IOC “MEMOS”, a Master in sport management, and a PhD in Physical Education. Former Director of the School of Sport of the Italian Olympic Committee (CONI) and Director of the Anti-doping Department of NADO Italy, currently he is the CONI General Affairs Manager. Married to Claudia, fencer and fencing teacher, with two children (Alberto and Giulia), both student-athletes, winners of titles and medals at the World, European and National Youth Fencing Championships.
12:35 Dual Career and International Multi Sport Events of Student-Athletes
KOLË GJELOSHAJ – Deputy Secretary General of the International School Sport Federation (ISF) and Chair of the Consultative Committee Bureau of EPAS Council of Europe Since 1996, he developed his career in international multisport federations covering positions dealing with education, members relations, institutional affairs, and protocol. He set up the International University Sports Federation (FISU) educational and development departments and the related committees. He was the team leader of the Proclamation by UNESCO (2015) of the International Day of University Sport. He joined ISF in 2018 as strategic cooperation director. He is scientific collaborator (2000-) to the Free University of Brussels (ULB) and a speaker (2015-) in the Master in Sport Management, Marketing and Society (Universita Milano- Bicocca). He is an alumnus of ULB (Political sciences) and the University of Pisa (Anti-mafia and corruption).
12:45 General discussion
TECHNICAL INFORMATION
EAS will manage the ZOOM link for the EAS members in order to access the
“Parenting Dual Career Athletes”
Zoom Meeting November 30, 2020 (from 12:00 CET)
EAS will use the registered email address for sending the ZOOM link that the EAS member has provided during registration.
Should you have any question, please contact us on kozslatibor@gmail.com email address.
EU funded ERASMUS+ SPORT Collaborative Partnerships starting in 2021
On October 20, 2020, EACEA published the results of the selected proposals for ERASMUS+ SPORT to be started on January 1, 2021. Under the EC priority on sports “Promote education in and through sport with special focus on skills development, as well support the implementation of the EU Guidelines on Dual Careers of Athletes” EAS is partner of three Collaborative Partnerships:
BRAVA-DC: Brand Value Alignment through Dual Career, Coordinated by University of Limerick (Ireland) in cooperation with Aarhus Kommune (Denmark), European Platform for Sports and Innovation (Belgium), EUSA Institite (Slovenia), Faculty of Sport and Physical Education, University of Nis (Serbia), Fondazione Human Age (Italy), Università diegli Studi Roma Tre (Italy), Univerza V Ljubljani (Slovenia), and EAS (Malta). The primary focus of BRAVA-DC is on enhancing the European workplace environment so the circumstances and challenges of dual career athletes and coaches can more effectively be accommodated. The BRAVA-DC project aims are: 1) to structure an evidence and eminence knowledge base on dual career for employee-athletes and 2) to define and enable European guidelines which support DC in the workplace and which facilitate appropriate brand alignment strategies and CSR policies which value DC. Accordingly, the overarching aim of the BRAVA-DC project is to implement the EU Guidelines on Dual Careers of Athletes.
EL CAMP: A Self-employment Career Option for Elite Athletes: Innovative Sport-focused Entrepreneurship Bootcamp, coordinated by Collective Innovation AS (Norway) in cooperation with European Paralympic Committee (Austria), Fundacion Universitaria San Antonio (Spain), Hogskolen I Molde (Norway), Lietuvos Sporto Universitetas (Lithuania), Olimpijski Komite Slovenije Zdruzenje Sportnih Zvez (Slovenia). The overall objectives of ELCAMP are to support the implementation of the EU Guidelines Dual Careers of Athletes through the development of a sports-focused entrepreneurship program and to contribute to innovative approaches to sports-focused entrepreneurship through an entrepreneurship bootcamp curriculum, training modules, toolkits and learning, mentoring and networking platform in line with talented, elite and retired athletes needs and expectations.
PARA-LIMITS: Dual Career of Student- Athletes with Disabilities as a Tool for Social Inclusion, coordinated by the Fundacion Universitaria San Antonio (Spain) in cooperation with Collective Innovation AS (Norway), European Paralympic Committee (Austria), Fundacion Once Para la Cooperacione Inclusion Social de Personas (Spain), Instituto Politecnico de Viseu (Portugal), Università degli Studi di Roma Foro Italico (Italy), Universitatea Nationala De Educatie Fizica Si Sport Din Bucuresti (Romania), University of Limerick (Ireland) and EAS (Malta). The main objectives are: to detect the needs and barriers athletes-students with disabilities have in combining their sports and university commitments; to adapt the Dual Career model to elite athletes with disabilities for promoting their social integration and for supporting their transition to the labor market at the end of their sports careers; to create an innovative course for university staff to serve as sports mentors for athletes-students with disabilities.
More information on the selected ERASMUS+ SPORT 2020 proposals iS available at https://eacea.ec.europa.eu/erasmus-plus/selection-results/erasmus-sport-2020_en
Thanks to the Team of the University of Hamburg and the efforts of the EAS Executive Committee the dual career community met also in 2020 despite the restrictions COVID-19 pandemic.
The one-day virtual event included three sections: lectures on the European dual career discourse, the reports of eight Collaborative Partnerships in dual career, and two dual career workshops.
On behalf of the Organizing Committee, Joerg Foerster (University of Hamburg Sport Service and EAS Board Member) welcomed more than 100 participants from different Continents despite the relevant difference in time zones.
Then, President Laura Capranica updated on the involvement of the Network in several exciting applications on dual career aspects still in need to be considered, and on its election as a Member of the Consultative Committee Bureau of the EPAS-Council of Europe, and on a future dissemination activity for its members.
Yves Le Lostecque, Head of the Sport Unit of the European Commission, informed on the European strategies, policies, programmes, opportunities, and activities also in light of the actual pandemic crisis.
Agata Dziarnowska, who recently joined the Marie Sklodowska-Curie Actions of the European Commission, contributed to a vision of the future European dual career.
The career counsellors Pamela Wittfothand and Leif Böhnert informed the participants on the German dual career approach and work at the Olympic Training Center in Hamburg.
- For the EU-funded Collaborative Partnerships in dual career, Philip Fuchs presented the findings of the AMiD survey on dual career of migrating athletes;
- Federica Stradi reported on the approach of the DONA project, which is grounded on the needs of youth female volleyball players;
- Antonio Figueiredo presented the educational programme for parents of dual career athletes based on the evidence and eminence knowledge acquired during the EMPATIA project;
- Pascal Izzicupo illustrated the dual career advancements at higher education institutes resulting from the More Than Gold project and the findings of the survey on dual career during the COVID-19 lockdown;
- Daniela Drago illustrated the aims of the Sport Opens School project, which encompasses dual career in an innovative educational approach of physical education;
- Dennis van Vlaanderen and Wolfgang Stockinger presented the progress of the European toolkit for dual career service providers of the STARTING 11 project; and
- Cvita Gregov illustrated the objectives of the We Care project, encompassing a Comprehensive Athlete Information System and the to establish three National Athletic Care and Development Centres in the Balcan region.
Finally, two interesting workshops allowed deep insights in the ED MEDIA and STARTING 11 projects. In particular, for ED MEDIA Inga Staškevičiūtė-Butienė presented the outcomes of the gaps in the implementation of the EU Dual Career Guidelines for Athletes, Ferran Calabuig-Moreno the videos on the opinions of a manager, a policy maker, and a Rector, Ole Keldorf led the discussion on potential activities to raise the awareness on dual career, and Irena Valentine collected the participants’ opinion on how to advance dual career trough media.
During the STARTING 11 workshop moderated by Dennis van Vlaanderen and Wolfgang Stockinger, two tools of the European dual career toolkit were presented, and the participants’ feedback on their content and format were gathered.
Finally, Cristina Cortis presented the venue of the 2022 EAS Annual Conference to be hosted by the University of Cassino and Southern Lazio in the Angevin-Aragonese Castle of Gaeta, Italy.
On Friday, June 5th, 2020, the weekly virtual coffee meeting of the UNISPORT Italia presented a the gender-specific approach to dual career “E-learning and training: The recipe for female youth athletes of the future”.
President Paolo Bouquet introduced the speakers Raffaella Masciadri (President of the Athletes’ Committee of the Italian Olympic Committee), Alessandra Ortenzi (Sport Web Journalist, Digital PR and Sport Strategist) and Federica Stradi (Scuola di Pallavolo Anderlini, Partner of the DONA project), who presented their unique and innovative efforts to address several essential development stages and major dual career transitions of female athletes.
The 42 participants were informed on the development of an e-learning education programme tailored for female athletes as well as the aims and progression of the DONA project focused on the holistic development of youth female volleyball players. During the general discussion, the opportunity to connect with other related projects to enhance the effective development of a dual career in Italy was envisaged. In particular, the expected outcomes of the Starting 11 (the European toolkit for dual career service providers) and the EMPATIA (the online educational programme for parents of dual career athletes) projects were particularly appreciated.
As a Member of EAS, the proactive dual career attitude of UNISPORT-Italia represents a valuable good practice to advance the European sports culture.
EAS Executive Committee members meet online
Due to the COVID-19 pandemic restrictions, on May 13th the Members of the Executive Committee of the European Athletes as Student met online to discuss the following issues:
- EAS President’s contribution to the FISU Healthy Campus project – (fisuhealthycampus.sport);
- meeting of the Consultative Committee Bureau of EPAS-Council of Europe;
- approve the 2019 activity and financial report of EAS;
- update on the progress of the on-going EU-funded projects AMID, DONA, ED MEDIA EMPATIA, More Than Gold, SOS, Starting 11;
- EAS involvement in the 2020 applications for Collaborative Partnerships in dual-career;
- possible activities to be featured during 2020;
- EAS Conference 2020 (Hamburg) organisation possibility and potential solutions;
- EAS ExCom members agreed that the next online meeting will take place in June.
The EAS Members of the Executive Committee appreciated that the Executive Agency of EACEA will provide responses to possible coordinator’s report of any negative impacts of the COVID-19 on EU-funded projects implementation https://eacea.ec.europa.eu/about-eacea/coronavirus-impact_en
REG. NUMBER: Voluntary Organisation registration VO/1270
PIC NUMBER: 913459865
Email: info@dualcareer.eu