StrongHER

Pledge description

In November 2021, FESI pledges to launch an EU-wide communication campaign (“StrongHER”) with a special focus on young girls. It will support the HealthyLifestyles4all initiative. The campaign will also conduct a study assessing the impact of sport/PA for people’s physical and mental wellbeing during the COVID-19 pandemic.

Our objective is to promote the benefits of physical activity and healthy lifestyles for physical and mental health, with a special focus on young girls.

We are also concerned with ensuring access to everyone. Today, there are still thousands of girls that don’t practice sport and miss many of its benefits, including improved health and self-esteem. Our goal for the next two years will be to contribute at our level to overcoming some of the barriers that still prevent young girls from accessing sport and healthy lifestyles.

This will be done through providing material and on-the-ground support to existing initiatives. For example

• European Week of Sport / ESSD sporting goods’ donation
• training to increase girls’ participation in sport at school sports activities
• activating our members and connecting some of their existing initiatives to a wider European audience and to find new partners at EU level
• providing the expertise of our members to contribute to diverse EU studies, policy work and conferences aiming at promoting the benefits of physical activity for health
• encouraging the development of sustainable and safe infrastructures (lights on cycle tracks, separate changing rooms or locks on showers etc) through the different EU funding streams
• encouraging the development of specific EU standards & benchmarks for sport facilities in the EU (minimum EU requirement to make sure they are: safe, accessible, sustainable)
• fostering the development of EU-wide standards to make sure that coaches have the necessary and appropriate training and experience to coach children/girls
• developing communication activities and materials specifically targeted at the promotion of physical activity among girls (videos, partnerships with our members’ ambassadors etc.)
• Other avenues can be considered together with members and other stakeholders

Measureable outcomes

• Increased number of kids and girls physically active
• More access to sport infrastructures for young girls and women
• Increased number of reliable data on the benefits of sport for health (esp. taking into account COVID).

To measure this outcome, we will try to aggregate the following data

• Participation: the number of participants in our activities during the European Week of Sport as well as the number of young people sensitized through the activities of our members
• Infrastructures: the possible increase in EU fundings and the number of new infrastructures created that meet the safety criteria for young women.
• Communication: the number of interactions on our videos and posts
• Study: the number of people responding to our survey and indicating the positive impact of sport for their physical and mental wellbeing during COVID