The third SHARE 2.0 online Community of Practice (COP) session was held on February 11. The thematic session on Innovation focused on Sport sector innovations driving social change.

The event started with introductions and welcome addresses by Jordi Bakker and Gregorz Botwina from the Innovation COP, and on behalf of the European Commission Stefano Pintus, Policy Officer at the Sport Unit, Directorate-General for Education, Youth, Sport and Culture (DG EAC).

In the first part, a keynote presentation "Investing in sport as a catalyst for social change” was done by Alexis Saillard on behalf of the UNESCO Sport Section. After introducing the general framework and Fit for Life platform, some specific initiatives and actions were also shared with the participants.

In the second part, four different local initiatives were presented: The ball box project by Alo Looke, Competence Centre for Physical Activity from Estonia; Revitalising urban spaces for sport by Ricardo Carvalho, Social Innovation Sports from Portugal; Fostering inclusion and engagement through innovative street sport facilities by Simon Prahm, GAME from Denmark; and How partnerships bring major sport events to local communities by from Michel Reinders, BrabantSport from the Netherlands.

Participants were also able to express their views and discuss open question about the initiatives presented, as well as generally how an impactful actions could be implemented locally.

For more information about SHARE 2.0 initiative, please see https://sport.ec.europa.eu/initiatives/share-20