March 9, 2023 | in Gender Equality, Education
On the occasion of International Women’s Day, FISU and its Gender Equality Committee organized a webinar on March 9 to highlight best practices and leading projects in the area of ??gender equality and sustainable sport. Acting President of FISU, Leonz Eder, opened the webinar and commented: “The issue of gender equality still preoccupies most governments, companies and organizations. This alone shows that there is still much work to be done in this regard.” Commission Chair Rosaura Mendez Gamboa added in her remarks: “Today it is important to build a world with more opportunities for all, where no one is left behind, where inclusion is the key to new struggles. FISU is [seeking] new proposals that allow our organization to open up more spaces and opportunities.”
Nika Tikanashvili from the University Sports Federation of Georgia (USFG) presented a recent project on volunteers and their role in the development of sport, which highlighted the crucial role of women in this context. He noted some results, including “[it provided] increase of knowledge, skills and attitudes [for] volunteers during the planning and organization of events.” Participants in this session included students from all over Georgia, representatives from universities and Georgian sports federations, and USFG member universities, FISU and various levels of government collaborated on this important initiative.
The upcoming Women in Sport Leadership Summit was introduced by Laurel Black, FISU Student Ambassador. Speaking about the motivation behind organizing the event, Black said: “[we are] adopting the approach of providing role models and representation of women by inviting guest speakers to come and speak about their experiences and providing these role models to our student athletes and sports management students.” Participants are expected to gain valuable insights and ideas to support the development of their career paths and plans. The speakers’ experiences and background will be shared around topics such as:
Strength and confidence in the field
How to defend yourself and others
How to use the web
Mental health and how it manifests itself in a woman’s body
This event will take place on April 10, 2023 in Raleigh, North Carolina, United States, on the campus of North Carolina State University, one of the host locations of the FISU World University Games Summer 2029.
Participants then hacked newsgroups to analyze the activities of various national college sports federations (NUSF) in relation to gender equality and sustainable sport. Egide Nduwimana said their group had discussed how gender equality status is progressing but is at a different stage in Africa than in places like Australia. Another participant, Min Joo Kim, discussed how her group discussed greater volunteering opportunities, mentoring programs and choices that would include more women to help better establish gender equality.
At the end of the webinar, the FISU Gender Equality Awards were discussed. These include the FISU Gender Equality Project Award, the FISU Gender Equality Champion Award, and the new FISU Extraordinary Award category. Nominations from the NUSF are open until June 1, 2023.
