REfugee Women INclusion through Sports

The REWINS project has been implemented according to the initial project description with slight changes in the project timeline and outputs due to the social distancing rules and closure of sport facilities in 2020 and part of 2021. The project has been granted a 6 months extension.The partners of the REWINS project (Fare network, Girl Power Organisation- GPO, Polisportiva San Precario- PSP and Organisation Earth- OE) met on the 18th of January 2019 in London for the Kick-off meeting. During the meeting the partners discussed the project, work packages, intellectual outputs, the responsibilities of each partner and the upcoming tasks. In addition, the partners agreed on the monitoring and evaluation strategy and the dissemination plan.The project debuted with a Research Study aimed at identifying refugee women’s barriers to participation at the local sport activities and good adaptable practices collection. To collect the data two questionnaires (one addressed to coaches and another to refugee women) were developed by Organisation Earth and implemented by all the partners. The Research Study finalised in June 2019, managed to reach only 85 responders from the 120 initially targeted. The collected data was made available by Fare network on the refugeesandfootball website: https://refugeesandfootball.org/rewins .During the second phase of the project, Fare network and PSP developed the structure of the Training Course. The second partners meeting was organised in Padova, Italy between 14th and 15th of September 2019, during which the partners discussed the Training Course structure, adjusted and agreed on it. Fare network and PSP further developed the Training Course structure and in October the content of the Training Course was shared with the partners. Based on the Training Course content each partner implemented between October and December 2019, 4 Seminars addressed to coaches working with or interested in working with refugees. Fare network collected the feedback from the Seminars and adjusted the content of the Training Course.Between 23rd and 30th of September 2019, Polisportiva San Precario, Girl Power Organisation and Organisation Earth participated in the European Week of Sport during which they organised sport activities for refugee women . This was also a good opportunity to move to the next step of the project- formation of refugees’ women’s teams. This was possible due to the fact that the part of the participants at the European Week of Sport (EWOS )wanted to continue being active as part of the football team. In 2019 Organisation Earth, Girl Power Organisation and Polisportiva San Precario organised sport activities with and for refugee women during the EWOS. In 2020 only Girl Power Organisation managed to organise an event during the EWOS. Polisportiva San Precario organised local events to promote the use of sport for the inclusion of refugees in the host community.Although the refugee women’s football teams have been created in the partners 'countries their participation in football activities in 2020 and 2021 has been hindered by the lockdown and social distancing rules. The women football teams started their activities in January 2020, but by March 2020 the activities had to be cancelled. Throughout 2020 and 2021 the partners meetings were held only online. The end of the project was marked by a festival for refugees organised by Girl Power Organisation in Denmark and an online event around the use of sport to include refugee women in host communities.