Rainbow Youth for Sporting Equality

Rainbow Youth for Sporting Equality (RYSE) was a multilateral European project which aimed to improve experiences for lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, intersex and queer (LGBTIQ+) young people in sport. To achieve these results: we worked with LGBTIQ+ young people to create a charter of inclusion for youth sport; we trained sport educators on the charter thus improving their skills in supporting LGBTIQ+ young people in sport; we took opportunities to take our message to different youth sport settings and target change; we developed an open source cross-border training tool for sports educators. The project started by having some local info days where young people who were interested in the project could hear more about it and sign up to get involved. Working in a co-produced way with young people, we asked them to outline what they expect from an inclusive and non-discriminatory sports environment to help create a Rainbow Sports charter. The project then went on to train youth sports educators in how to create such an environment. The young people went on to get involed in being on the films that are part of the online training modules. In each aspect of the project, we worked across different youth sports settings, targeting both formal and non-formal education settings. The project team distilled the training into an online training module which we presented at a final project conference in Zagreb. The project results have helped to:Increase knowledge and awareness regarding sport and physical activities.Increase awareness of the role of sport in promoting equal opportunities.Strengthen cooperation between institutions and organisations in the field of sport and physical activity.The main target group for this project was sports educators who work with young people. The charter was co-produced through formal and non-formal education settings and the sports educators were from a similar variety of youth settings which include school, college, university, youth groups, youth sports clubs and informal groups of young people. Ensuring that you practice inclusively and without discriminating is an important part of your role as a sports educator, and it's therefore becoming increasingly expected that educators will be cognisent of these issues and this project has developed a tool that enables this to happen and which is youth-led, youth-centred and reflects the realities of the experiences of LGBTIQ+ young people in sport and physical activity.