Find out which countries are starting the new year with new physical activity strategies, and save the dates for MOVE Week 2016, the Erasmus+ Sport Infoday and VeloCity Global in Taiwan, <<First Name>> <<Last Name>>!

NowWeMOVE calendar for 2016 takes shape

European MOVE Week “springs” to May

Building on successful trials of new initiatives in 2015, the NowWeMOVE campaign is expanding its all-year round activity even further in 2016. The campaign, initiated by the International Sport and Culture Association (ISCA), is planned to include more initiatives targeting European citizens and promoting the importance and benefits of the regular physical activity.

“In 2015 we invested significant resources to build and strengthen the brand and identity of the NowWeMOVE campaign,” Laska Nenova, the NowWeMOVE Campaign Manager for Europe, explains. â€œOur goal for 2016 is to set an all-year round series of activities instead of focusing on one big event in the year. Apart from the citizens in the participating countries we are also going to target some specific groups such as schools, fitness communities, office workers, bikers, etc., as endorsers of regular physical activity."

The 5th edition of NowWeMOVE’s signature event MOVE Week in Europe is scheduled for the first time in the spring (23-29 May 2016). So far the initiative has taken place in September, however ISCA is trying a new approach to get more inactive people involved outdoor physical activity in the beginning of the spring and summer seasons, when it is more likely to encourage a change in their habits. Additionally, placing MOVE Week in spring will remove the confusion some have expressed about the overlap between MOVE Week and European Commission-led European Week of Sport and thus enable ISCA to fully continue its support of the Commission’s #BeActive initiative.

MOVE Week in Latin America will remain in September, and the goal is to expand even further beyond last year’s growth in participation, which reached over 6,100 events and 1.5 million individual participants in 5 Latin American countries.

Read the full story here

ISCA nominated for PR News CSR Award for Corporate-Community Partnership

ISCA has been selected as a finalist in the PR News CSR Awards under the Corporate-Community Partnership category. The winner will be announced in Washington DC, USA, on 15 March. Meanwhile, the NowWeMOVE campaign narrowly missed out on a European Excellence Award in Stockholm in December, after having been shortlisted in the Sports and Lifestyle category among 4 other nominees including Adidas, Ericsson and eventual winner Kari Traa. The NowWeMOVE campaign was one of the few nominees across the award categories that did not use an external agency to assist in building their campaign. ISCA Secretary General Jacob Schouenborg said he was more than pleased with this achievement: “We are proud to be nominated and shortlisted out of 1300 entries overall and as one of only 5 organisations in this category.”

See the full list of PR News CSR Award nominees here

See the full list of European Excellence Award winners here

New research builds on Good Governance in Grassroots Sport project 

The results of ISCA’s Good Governance in Grassroots Sport project (GGGS) continue to have an impact on the global discussion on good governance in sport organisations operating at the community level, with a new article published on the topic in the Mykolas Romeris University and Kaunas University of Technology’s Public Policy and Administration Journal at the end of 2015. The GGGS project’s research experts, Simone Digennaro from the University of Cassino and Southern Lazio, Dept. of Human Sciences, Italy, and Mark Lowther from Cardiff Metropolitan University, School of Sport, in Wales co-authored the paper, which underlines the importance of continuing to support community organisations in self-assessment and self-regulatory actions, and emphasises the value of the GGGS self-assessment tool in providing the framework for this.

Read the full article here

Test your organisation’s good governance with the GGGS self-assessment tool

Youth on the MOVE learning platform to be launched in February

The Youth on the MOVE project learning platform for young European and Latin American volunteers in grassroots sport will be officially launched on 17 of February. Divided into online and offline training, the project, supported by the EU’s Erasmus+ Youth programme, will train 77 young people across Europe and Latin America to become MOVE Agents on both continents. Over the past few months, the collaborating project partners – ISCA, SESC, UBAE and V4Sport – have been working on the content of the online training modules, covering topics such as proactivity, sustainable activation, event management, sustainable partnerships and human resource management. Designed for each topic to last around 3 weeks, the training modules will allow the participants to receive theoretical knowledge from experts, get practical assignments and be tested on what they have learned.

Read the full story

BG Be Active starts 2016 with new project and new partners

2015 was a milestone year for Bulgarian ISCA member BG Be Active, which secured its first large-scale EU grant under the Erasmus+ Sport programme with the Collaborative Partnerships project Active School Communities (which kicked off this week in Berlin) won a Best Campaign award for MOVE Week in Bulgaria, and established a partnership with the Human Resource Development Centre (HRDC) in Bulgaria to ensure that its activities become more sustainable. HRDC is the national agency managing European Educational programmes and it has extensive experience and networks from the EU’s Erasmus programmes. 

Read the full story

Erasmus+ Sport Infoday to take place on 3 March

The European Commission and EACEA are holding their Sport Infoday on 3 March this year in Brussels, Belgium. The day is intended to give non-profit organisations a walk-through of the Erasmus+ Sport funding programme. The hosts will present updates on the changes made to the programme this year, show how the application process works, give examples of successful applicants from 2015 and outline this year’s opportunities. Organisations will soon be invited to register to attend the event, with up to 2 representatives allowed from each organisation. If you’re not attending the event in-person, you will also be able to follow the sessions online. 

Keep an eye out for news on the Erasmus+ Sport Infoday online here
NO TIME FOR NEVER
The Australian Sports Commission has released a series of videos promoting physical activity among the elderly. Too old? To these folks, you're never too old to get in there and  "have a go"!

UK Government broadens strategy for an “Active Nation”

The British Government has broadened its strategy on sport and physical activity, releasing a new policy document on 17 December featuring input from several Ministers and MEPs, case studies and a comprehensive list of key performance indicators. As part of the new strategy, its renamed “Active Lives” survey will measure how “people are active overall – rather than how often they take part in any particular sport”. CEO of ISCA member StreetGames, Jane Ashworth, outlines the highlights of the new strategy on LinkedIn and StreetGames is holding discussions on the document with its regional stakeholders in January and February.

Read the full strategy

Ireland launches first national physical activity plan

Four Irish government ministers have initiated the nation’s first physical activity plan, backed by €5.5 million in funds for its implementation in 2016. The plan, launched on 14 January, aims to get half a million people active within the next 10 years and will focus on citizens who never exercise, as well as schools, the workplace and the community as settings to encourage more physical activity.

Read more

Taiwan ready for VeloCity Global active transport conference

The Evolution of Cycling is the topic that will be under the spotlight in the VeloCity Global 2016 conference in Taipei, Taiwan, from 27 February to 1 March. The conference programme has now been published and the earlybird registration fee will be available until 18 February. The programme features speakers from Asia, Australia and Europe, including staff from ISCA partner the European Cyclists’ Federation.

Read more

Manifesto aims to give children “Best Start in Life”

The British Heart Foundation National Centre for Physical Activity and Health (BHFNC) has released a manifesto to prompt “policy makers to embed early years physical activity into physical activity policy nationally, regionally and locally to ensure physical activity is supported across the UK”. The manifesto has four asks in the areas of awareness, education, environment and health.

Read more

Physical activity “common denominator” in cardio health and obesity

An article published in the American Medical Association’s latest issue of JAMA Internal Medicine has emphasised the impact that reduced levels of physical activity have had on cardiorespiratory fitness and obesity over the past five decades. It describes physical activity as a “common denominator” in they key risk factors for cardiovascular disease.

Read more
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