Sport is a people-facing sector, where the engagement of others, at grass roots or high performance level, is paramount to its success. Moreover, sport is ingrained across all communities, affecting a large percentage of the population, and is used to address wider Government agendas including health, social inclusion, regeneration and education. If we are to meet these challenges, it is imperative that those working or volunteering in face to face roles, at the delivery end of the sector, are equipped with the necessary skills through fit for purpose qualifications.
The sector is growing fast across the EU and employers are seeking well trained employees able to match the requirements of a more demanding clientele. Overall, there is a gap between the competencies required by sport employers and the learning outcomes acquired by employees through training.
Recently, through the
EQF-Sport project (
ran by EOSE between 2007 & 2008 and funded by the European Commission), a common Lifelong Learning Strategy (LLL 7 Steps Strategy for Sport) to develop occupational standards has been developed for the whole Sport and Active Leisure sector to:
- Promote a transparent and flexible education and training system with clear learning and career pathways.
- Ensure the development of a competent workforce with the right skills and competences in line with the expectation of the employers, to facilitate the movement between education and employment.
- Develop mobility, transparency and mutual trust of qualifications, raise standards and facilitate the growth of business opportunities.
To foster those findings, a one year LLL Sport project funded by the European Commission and led by EOSE has been developed not only to further foster awareness-raising of the common Lifelong Learning Strategy to develop occupational standards, which is regarded as crucial on national, regional and local level, but also to encourage its concrete implementation and to contribute to better coherence and coordination in the establishment and implementation of comprehensive National LLL Strategies within the sector of Sport and Active Leisure. The project started on March 2010 and will end at the end of February 2010.
Further information about the project will be published in the next versions of the EOSE E-Bulletin.