Early Life Skills and Gender Equality through Football

<< Background >>The 2020 EU Guidance report on Gender Equality in Education highlights the insufficient application of gender-equality strategies in early education, contributing to ongoing issues like gender exclusion and discrimination. Our project addressed this by using sports, specifically football, as a teaching tool to promote values like respect, fair play, and inclusion.Despite efforts by educational and public authorities to promote gender equality in sports, obstacles remain. Women continue to participate in sports less than men, and disparities, particularly in football, persist in terms of gender pay gaps and involvement. Studies in Cyprus and Italy reveal that gender-segregated classes and underrepresentation of women in sports governance reinforce gender biases from an early age. The HERSPORT project challenged these biases through a three-tier approach: addressing gender-biased attitudes, enhancing sports pedagogy to boost gender parity and life skills, and organizing mixed-gender football tournaments in early education to create experiential learning opportunities that promote gender equality.<< Objectives >>The overall aim of the project was to advocate against gender discrimination using football as the means of sports-based experiential learning in early education.The objectives of project were to (1) advance quality in early education through knowledge exchange from female footballers and physical education (PE) teachers, school leaders on gender segregation in sports, (2) address gender inequality using sport pedagogical approaches that can develop and empower girls’ leadership skills, (3) encourage sports experiential-based learning through mixed-gender games, (4) accelerate knowledge-sharing, virtual mentoring between PE early educators, school leaders and female footballers.<< Implementation >>The activities of the project included the following: 1.The development of training materials (HER SPORT Training Package) for PE teachers and school leaders available in 3 languages (GR, EN, IT).2.Development of a digital platform, Virtual Mentoring from female footballers to PE educators and school leaders, and digital guides and resources.3.Training 70 PE educators, school leaders and 80 female students.4.Implementation of 2 Mixed-Gender Football Games comprising of 121 of students5.Implementation of 2 of ‘Inter-Schools Mixed-Gender Football tournaments comprising 346 students.6.Dissemination of the project via local events, social media campaigns, and video stories reaching 99,448 stakeholders.7.3 Gender Equality and Sports in Education Festivals reaching 258 participants. 8.Extra events were also conducted by the consortium reaching an additional 490 participants (beyond the planned indicators).<< Results >>(1) A training package on equal gender football participation in schools, including teaching materials and on-field & classroom based activities for educators to use with their students;(2) digitalisation of HER SPORT Training Package; (3) training 70 PE educators & school leaders to carry out gender-equal football games and organize and implement football gender equality trainings; (4)virtual mentoring sessions that allowed for cross-border networking and exchange of best practices between 41 primary educators and sport experts in Cyprus and Italy; (5) on-field Implementations enabling PE educators and school leaders to apply their learning in conducting 10 classroom and on-field training sessions with 121 female students, organizing 2 mixed-gender football games with 174 male and female students and organizing 2 Inter-Schools Mixed-Gender Football tournaments involving 3 different school and a total of 346 male and female students; (6)dissemination of the project utilizing digital tools, audio-visual materials, and communication networks reaching 99,448 school educators, PE teachers, sport experts, trainers, female footballers, policy makers, youth, public services, target groups associations, civil society and EU citizens.