Dora Alexandropoulou, General Secretariat of Sports of Hellenic Republic, explains the role of his organization in the SPEY project and what has been achieved so far.
1) What made you join the project? What would you highlight?
a) The very interesting subject of the project addressed to youngsters and b) our previous cooperation with UFEC and especially with Ms. Milena de Murga in the European Project ASPIRE-Sport as a tool for the inclusion of young refugees (https://www.aspiresport.eu/)
2) Sport, youth and radicalization: 3 powerful words, how do you contribute to the project and from what point of view / experience?
As a public sector body, we cannot join the program as a regular partner, nevertheless we continued to cooperate with all of you, wherever and whenever required.
3) How has the pandemic affected the development of this task? Are you achieving your goals?
For the reasons we explained above, as General Secretariat of Sports, we didn’t take over any specific task, but although the pandemic was a very difficult period for all of us, both individually and in terms of cooperation at work, SPEY program a.s.o. we think that all partners managed to overcome some obstacles and we kept on working as well as updating each other through our video conferences during the whole pandemic period up to now.
4) From your experience in other European projects, what accomplishment do you feel most proud of?
“#BEACTIVE-European Week of Sport-promoting the importance of sports and physical activity every day of the year regardless of age/physical condition/mental or body disability” is the project we have been working on for the last seven years. We have developed the program a lot, making it very popular throughout Greece, greatly increasing each year both the number of sporting events and the number of sport participants and spectators (http://beactive-shapeeurope.eu/)
About the SPEY project
The SPEY project (Sport for the Prevention of Extremism in Youth) started in February 2020 led by the Union of Sports Federations of Catalonia. The project, co-financed by the European Commission, has a duration of 30 months, and has the support of 7 countries and 9 ‘partners’, including the Confederation of Sports of Sweden, the Union of Federations of Latvia, the International Council of Sport and Physical Education of Germany, the City Council of Gondomar of Portugal, the Ministry of Culture and Sport of Greece, the French ‘think tank’ Sport and Citizenship, and the University of Córdoba.
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