The launch meeting of the joint CoE-EU joint project “All In plus” took place on 10 May 2023 at the Council of Europe in Strasbourg and brought together a total of 168 participants (119 women and 49 men) -experts and partners - in a hybrid format.
The opening session was opened by Marja Ruotanen, Director General of Democracy and Human Dignity of the Council of Europe; Themis Christophidou, Director General for Education, Youth, Sport and Culture of the European Commission; João Paulo Correia, Secretary of State for Youth and Sports of Portugal; and Óskar Þór Ármannsson, Head of the Sport Unit, Ministry of Education and Children of Iceland.
The first panel on the position of women in sport was moderated by Annamarie Phelps, Chair, Gender Equality, Diversity and Inclusion Commission, European Olympic Committees; International Working Group (IWG) on Women and Sport. Speakers included Violeta Birzniece, Policy Officer, Directorate General for Education, Youth, Sport and Culture at the European Commission who presented the findings of the EU High-level Gender Equality Working Group report; as well as Anne-Flore Marxer, Film Director, Feminist activist and Snowboarding World Champion who presented her lived experience in the professional sport arena. Charlotte Girard-Fabre, Secretary General of the International Federation Sports Officials (IFSO) presented her work to engage more women referees in sport. Aurélie Bresson, President of the Alice Milliat Foundation and Founder of Les Sportives also shared her experience re. the position of women in sport. Finally Caterina Bolognese, Head of Gender Equality Division at the Council of Europe gave an update of the activities of her Division.
The second panel on the role of the media in sport was moderated by Elsa Arapi, Women’s Sport Lead at the European Broadcasting Union (EBU). Mary Byrne, Editor in Chief of the Olympic Channel Services at the International Olympic Committee (IOC) took the floor, as well as Mejdaline Mhiri, Sports commentator, journalist, handball player, and co-director of French association of women in sports journalism. Hilmar Björnsson, Sports director at Icelandic National Broadcasting Service, Andrew Moger, Director of News Media Coalition and Stéphanie Roque, journalist, and co-author and co-director of the documentary “Sur la Touche” also participated in this panel.
The third panel on “the power of data: presentation of data results and methodology” was moderated by Ioanna Paraskevopoulou, Gender Equality Rapporteur to the Governing Board of the Enlarged Partial Agreement on Sport (EPAS) of the Council of Europe. Francine Hetherington Raveney, Deputy Executive Secretary of the EPAS, presented the quantitative research methodology for ALL IN and All In Plus, data findings (2018-2019) and updates. Lombe Mwambwa, Research Director at the Global Observatory for Gender Equality and Sport (GO) spoke about collaborative global reach of the methodology; and Carole Gomez, University Researcher at the University of Lausanne (UNIL) spoke on data on gender-based violence in sport.
The fourth panel on best practice examples in sport was moderated by Thorsten Afflerbach, Head of Division, Inclusion and Anti-discrimination Programmes at the Council of Europe. Jane Dennehy, University Sports Management Lecturer and Gender Equality Expert spoke about unconscious bias and its role in sports education. Joëlle Letsch, Counsellor and Gender Equality Expert, Member of the Executive Board of the National Council of Women of Luxembourg, presented the Charter on Equality between Women and Men in Sport. Emma Bârsan, Women’s Football Development Manager & Press Officer for the Women’s National Team at the Romanian Football Federation (FRF) spoke about women in football. Barbara Schweizer, Senior Manager at the International Olympic Committee (IOC) presented the innovative approaches to advance gender equality in and through sport (Olympism365).
A screening of Anne-Flore Marxer‘s documentary “A land shaped by women” was followed by a questions and answers’ session, moderated by Emma Smith from the SOGI Unit of the Council of Europe (Sexual Orientation and Gender Identity)
Screening of a short Q&A moderated by Emma Smith, Sexual Orientation and Gender Identity (SOGI) Unit, Council of Europe
Anne-Flore Marxer, Film Director, Feminist activist and Snowboarding World Champion
Francine Hetherington Raveney and Floor van Houdt, Head of Sport Unit, Directorate General for Education, Youth, Sport and Culture at the European Commission, closed the launch event.
Experts and partners along with the European Commission and the Council of Europe Secretariat showed great enthusiasm for the launch of the new project "ALL IN PLUS – Promoting greater gender equality in sport" and were eager to start working on it.
See the videos:
MORNING SESSION
AFTERNOON SESSION
