Funding resources to provide and enhance social support for seniors, families, and other vulnerable Edmontonians who are impacted by COVID-19.

The Government of Alberta is providing emergency funding for local non-profit and charitable organizations to provide and enhance social support for seniors, families, and other vulnerable Edmontonians who are isolated or impacted by measures to contain COVID-19. These organizations will support a range of services needed from at-home help for seniors, crisis and help-lines, food security issues, emotional and mental health counselling or any other identified community issues. If your organization is providing an emergency response, and/or wishes to consider providing an emergency response, visit the guidelines.

COVID-19 Information and Resources

We know our communities, employees, and partners are receiving and reacting to new information day-to-day and dealing with significant uncertainty. As the situation changes daily, we want to keep you as up to date as possible. The Sport Council has compiled links to resources to help you with everything from creating work from home plans, business continuity, available funding for non profits and charities, and resources for your members and participants.

Active at Home

Families with children are looking for ways to #LiveActiveYEG at home, in their neighbourhood, and other locations which enable social distancing. To help them, the Edmonton Sport Council has placed links to hundreds of resources on https://www.edmontonsport.com/live_active/active_at_home.

To reach more families, we need your help in spreading knowledge of the existence of this resource. Therefore, we hope that you will cut and paste the above into your social media and/or emails or enews sent to staff, volunteers and/or clients.

COVID-19: Not time to panic, but absolutely time to take it seriously

In light of recent developments around the COVID-19 pandemic, most Edmonton sport and active recreation organizations have cancelled or postponed their programming. The City of Edmonton has recognized the impact of COVID-19 and has closed all recreation facility operations and programming. The Public Health Agency of Canada provides background information on how the virus is spread, prevention strategies and risk assessment.

Building Social Legacies: Through Mega, Major and Signature Sport Events

Hosting sport events can bring many positive benefits to the community. Traditionally, many of the benefits that motivate event hosts, governments and sponsors have focused predominantly on creating economic or sport impacts. More recently, mega, major and signature sport event organizers are being asked to help communities address long-standing social issues and to leave the community better than before. This resource provides the background and process for host committees, social agencies and governments to plan and deliver initiatives that leave social legacies. Background information and a reference list can be found here.

Sport Australia Physical Literacy Framework

Everyone has the potential to value, develop and maintain positive physical activity behaviours for life. Physical literacy involves holistic lifelong learning through movement and physical activity. It delivers physical, psychological, social and cognitive health and wellbeing benefits, for all Australians. Sport Australia has produced the Australian Physical Literacy Framework to support all Australians at every stage of life to develop their physical literacy.

Long-Term Development in Sport and Physical Activity 3.0

Sport for Life has released the revised Long-Term Development in Sport and Physical Activity 3.0 resource document, a framework for the development of every child, youth, and adult to enable optimal participation in sport and physical activity.

Sport for Life has also released Long-Term Officials Development guidelines, a practical web resource to support the development of quality official’s programs.

CCES Leading Development of Draft Universal Safe Sport Code

The Canadian Centre for Ethics in Sport has been asked by Sport Canada to lead the development of a Draft Universal Safe Sport Code to protect athletes and prevent prohibited misconduct in Canadian sport. The national sport organization Safe Sport Working Group announced seven core components and related consensus statements to guide the development of a universal code of conduct for Canadian sport following a landmark National Safe Sport Summit in May, hosted by the Coaching Association of Canada.

Building a Stronger Canada Through Values-Based Sport

In collaboration with the Public Policy Forum, the CCES hosted The Values Proposition: Building a Stronger Canada Through Values-Based Sport. The symposium aimed to inform and inspire thinkers, doers and decision makers throughout the Canadian sport community to ensure that values-based sport and the True Sport Principles are embedded in the modus operandi of sport, from playground to podium. The final report provides a comprehensive summary of the state of values-based sport in Canada and addresses where to go from here.

Government of Canada Funds an Investigation Unit and a National Toll-Free Helpline

On March 13, 2019, the Honourable Kirsty Duncan, Minister of Science and Sport, announced two new important initiatives to address harassment, abuse and discrimination in sport:

• An investigation unit for national sport organizations, multisport service organizations and Canadian sport centres to call in to have access to independent investigators for alleged incidents of harassment, abuse and discrimination; and
• A national toll-free confidential helpline for victims and witnesses of harassment, abuse and discrimination in sport. The helpline can be accessed by phone or text at 1-888-83-SPORT (77678) or by email at info@abuse-free-sport.ca, from 6 a.m. to 6 p.m. Mountain Time, seven days a week.

Read the entire news release here.

New Resource: Coaching Kids of All Abilities

Based on research by the Canadian Disability Participation Project (CDPP), the majority of people living with a disability do not participate in sufficient sport and exercise to achieve health benefits. Further research conducted by the CDPP determined that low sport and exercise participation rates and high dropout rates are largely due to the absence of experiencing quality participation. Coaching Kids of All Abilities is a collection of online programs that teaches coaches and youth activity leaders how to create inclusive environments in order to facilitate a positive first sport and recreation experience for youth of all abilities.

Quality Sport

Quality sport doesn't just happen, but occurs through intentional preparation. Sport New Zealand believes that quality sport, opportunities and experiences are vital to enrich and inspire the lives of young people by creating a lifelong love of sport. To this end, they have developed a great graphic of Young People's Quality Indicators. Sport for Life identifies that quality sport and physical activity are achieved when the right people do the right thing at the right time. Their ideas are presented in a Quality Sport Checklist.  Together, these two resources enable all organizations to advance quality sport. How's your organization doing?

The Live Active Update

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