On October 13, the SCORE team presented the result of the project and the final version of the interactive toolkit “Gender Equality in Coaching” during the Final Conference of the project on Strengthening Coaching with the Objective to Raise Equality (SCORE), co-financed by the Erasmus+ programme of the European Union.

The Conference, which took place in Cologne at the Trainer academy of the German Olympic Sports Confederation, located at the campus of the German Sport University Cologne, had several international speakers and guests.



The event was organised by European Non-Governmental Sports Organisation (ENGSO), together with the International Council for Coaching Excellence (ICCE), partner organisations of SCORE project. On behalf of the European University Sports Association (EUSA), which is also one of the core partners in the project, the event was attended by Mr Andrej Pisl, Communications and Projects Manager, and Mrs Jackie Newton, a coach and mentor.



The first part of the Conference was a joint plenary for ICCE and SCORE during which ENGSO Honorary President Mrs Birgitta Kervinen welcomed the participants and introduced the work that has been done on gender equality in sport, followed by welcoming remarks from the hosts and address of the European Commission by Mrs Paola Ottonello, Policy Officer in the Sport Policy and Programme Unit.



The plenary part concluded with Ms Heidi Pekkola from ENGSO presenting the overall results of the SCORE project and Mr Sergio Lara-Bercial from Leeds Beckett University the ones of the CoachLearn project.



During the parallel sessions, Ms Satu Kaski, sport psychologist and educator, shared information on the result of the Education for Mentors, which was one of the key elements of the project. Altogether, 22 mentors from 8 countries have been educated to support female coaches in their coaching pathway. From EUSA side the participants were Mrs Jackie Newton from United Kingdom and Mr Evandros Votsis from Cyprus.



Practical examples of implementation of partner activities in Cyprus, Germany and Portugal were presented, with a focus on the field of enhancing gender equality in coaching, as part and/or an upgrade of the project initiatives.



Mrs Leanne Norman from Leeds Beckett University presented the facts and figures about involvement of women in sports and Mrs Sarah Milner from Sport Coach UK presented the toolkit, one of the main products of the project, which has been developed and tested in different countries during the implementation of the project. The interactive toolkit contains tools with good practice examples for sport organizations to create a more gender equal environment and facilitate the access of women into coaching. In addition, it contains also information targeted to women who are interested in coaching. The toolkit will be shortly available and disseminated online and through the partners networks.



The Conference finished with the panel discussion “How to break the glass ceiling in coaching?”, moderated by Mrs Sallie Barker from ENGSO, with the participation of ICCE President Mr John Bales, Mrs Paola Ottonello from the European Commission, Mrs Evelina Georgiades from Cyprus Sport Organisation and Mr Mark Harrington from World Rugby.



The participation from the public was quite active and the discussion focused on the engagement of the IOC and sports governing bodies to have a top-down impact in the policy related gender equality and coaching at regional and national level and the needs form the national coordinators to push the different federation in starting their own mentoring programme to support female coaches.



The project will officially close in December but the dissemination and sustainability activities will continue through the project partners. At the partners meeting, the project was evaluated and activity plan set for activities until the end of the project cycle, and beyond it.



"Strengthening Coaching with the Objective to Raise Equality" – SCORE is a European project supported by the Erasmus+ Sport Programme of the European Union, bringing together 13 key partner organisations: European Non-Governmental Sports Organisation (ENGSO), Sport Coach UK, Finnish Coaches Association, International Council of Coaching Excellence (ICCE), European Observatoire of Sport and Employment (EOSE), Sport and Citizenship, European University Sports Association (EUSA), German Olympic Sports Confederation (DOSB), Swedish Sports Confederation (RF), National Olympic Committee of Croatia (NOC Croatia), Lithuanian Union of Sports Federations (LUSF), Cyprus Sports Organisation (CSO) and Portuguese Sports Confederation (CDP). SCORE promotes gender equality in coaching, and focuses on increasing the number of employed and volunteer female coaches at all levels of sport as well as enhancing knowledge on gender equality in coach education. SCORE is a two-year project, which started in 2014 and will be finalised by the end of 2016.

For more information, please visit our project page or the official website www.score-coaching.eu and follow the discussions on social media with #scorecoaching and #equalityincoaching.