"Guidelines regarding the minimum requirements in skills and competences for coaches", the result of a three year work by the European Commission Expert Group on Skills and HR Development in Sport (XG HR), is now published.
The publication aims to propose a common minimum set of competences for coaches in Europe. Along with the core competencies a coach should have, the document also outlines how the education or the training modules of the coaches can be improved.
Besides pointing out the growing demands and the expectations from the coaches, the work also emphasizes that coaches are not only role models in sports, but they also teach values such as respect and integrity.
The document was developed over several meetings of the European Commission Expert Group on Human Resources in Sport, including in February 2018 in Bath, UK, in July 2018 in Split, Croatia, in November 2018 in Salzburg, Austria, in May 2019 in Lisbon, Portugal and in November 2019 in Trento, Italy.
ENSE supported the group in its role as an observer, while ENSE member the International Council for Coaching Excellence made significant contributions to the document.
The document is available in English here
From 6th to 7th of February, The Association For International Sport For All (TAFISA) hosted the kick-off meeting for the project “Training the Female Sport for All Leaders of Tomorrow”, co-funded by the European Commission.
Besides representatives from the African Union Sports Council Region 5, the Olympic Committee of Slovenia, the University of Ljubljana as well as TAFISA, Louis Moustakas, Secretary General of ENSE, joined the two-days meeting in Frankfurt, Germany. This meeting provided the project partners with an opportunity to discuss the project objectives and plan the next steps which involve recruiting mentors and mentees from Europe and Southern Africa to create “mentoring trios” as a way to empower young women and equip them with the necessary skills and knowledge to lead the Sport for All Movement. ENSE will contribute two mentors and mentees from the ENSE network to the project.
In the first days of November, ENSE board member Antonio Tessitore participated in the COM XG Skills Meeting by the European Commission Expert Group on Sport.
The 5th meeting of the European Commission Expert Group "Skills and Human Resources Development in Sport" (XG HR) was held in Trento, Italy, from the 4th until the 5th of November 2019. The main themes of the 2-day seminar were the education and development of coaches, the mapping of dual careers of athletes in Europe as well as a wrap-up on the previous European Week of Sport and an outlook on upcoming Erasmus+ sport programmes. The meeting included several presentations and discussions on the development of the European dimension of sport, including the implementation of dual career of athletes.
Special thanks goes to the Italian colleagues for the great organisation. We are looking forward to the next and final meeting of the XG Skills under the Third EU Work Plan for Sport, which will be held in Estonia.
The gorgeous city of Lisbon hosted the 4th meeting of the European Commission Expert Group “Skills and Human Resources Development in Sport” (XG HR), which took place on 15–16 May 2019.
A long-time observer in the Group, ENSE had both its President, Dr. Karen Petry, and Executive Director, Louis Moustakas, in attendance.
At the meeting, the Commission and fellow observer organisations presented updates and findings from various actions, projects and research.
Most notably, during the session on the Education of Coaches, Sergio Lara-Bercial from the International Council for Coaching Excellence and Louis Moustakas presented their ongoing research into the status of sport coaching around Europe as part of the PEAK and CoachForce21 projects, both of which feature extensive involvement from ENSE members.
Elsewhere, the head of the Sport Unit, Yves Le Lostecque, gave an update on the European Commission's activities. Namely, he indicated that the 2019 Erasmus+ Sport Call for Projects received a total of 743 applications and that final results will be revealed in the fall. The Erasmus+ 2020 call for projects will also be launched around the same time, with 65 million Euros made available for sport projects.
Numerous other speakers also presented their activities. During the session on Qualifications in Sport, Cliff Collins from EuropeActive delved into the work of the Active Leisure has been doing to improve the professional qualifications in the sector, namely through the Blueprint project of which ENSE is a part of.
Antonia Hagemann of Supporters Direct Europe, Jana Havrdová from the Czech Chamber of Fitness, as well as Simone Digennaro and Ben Gittus from the European Observatoire of Sport and Employment (EOSE) also presented at the event.
The 4th meeting of the current Expert Group, ENSE was also on-site for the previous meetings in February 2018 in Bath, UK, in July 2018 in Split, Croatia, and in November 2018 in Salzburg, Austria.
The final meeting of the Expert Group is planned to take place during the final months of 2019 at a location to be announced.