FIS. More than 90 participants representing over 40 nations gathered on 2nd October 2013 in Zurich (SUI) for the FIS Youth & Children’s Seminar. This year, the meeting was combined with the FIS Development Programme Leaders’ Seminar to enable the key individuals and experts attending the FIS Technical Committee Meetings to contribute and participate in both Seminars focusing on the central theme: Recruiting and Retaining, Keeping children in competitive snow sports.
 
The opening presentations were made by Casey Peirce, Executive Director of Fast and Female and Klaus Leistner, Secretary General of the Austrian Ski Association.
 
“Keeping females in sport” was the central theme of the presentation by Casey Peirce. Dedicated to empowerment through young female participation in sport, Fast and Female has created camps in Canada with 120 female sport ambassadors, includingOlympians, to talk and interact with the girls with the goal of increasing retention of female athletes. These events have been very successful, evidenced by the number of female athletes on the rise.
 
Dr. Leistner reported about “The Austrian Experience”, informing the participants about national initiatives such as ski weeks as a compulsory activity for young school children. To minimise risks, the Austrian Ski Association offers insurance for school classes and some 10’000 skiing booklets containing rules and fun activities to educate and entertain pupils.
 
In the next session, representatives of National Ski Associations from Norway, Argentina, Slovenia, Greece, Armenia and the Czech Republic highlighted various methods to retain children in sport. One of the examples was the Armenian Ski Tour staged from mid-December until mid-March in five regions with teams competing against each other in different ski disciplines. Financial support was guaranteed by sponsors with the first prize being annual scholarships for the young winners.
 
The discussions were followed by an update about the FIS Development Programme (FDP) by FIS Council Member Roman Kumpost who informed the participants about the recent joining of the FIS Aid & Promotion and FIS Solidarity Programmes to optimise activities and resources and to improve the knowledge and competence of developing ski nations under the umbrella of the FDP.
 
Ken Read, Chairman of the FIS Coordination Group Youth & Children, concluded the seminar by highlighting: “We need to inspire kids to get engaged in snow sports and be innovative and flexible in these initiatives as we heard in the presentations during the seminar. Partnerships are a key component which we have to work with to build these programmes and to reach to the media in order to build audience. We also need to engage our past and current Champions as motivators for kids and use the tools that are available to us, such as World Snow Day, to recruit and retain children in snow sports.”
 
Both the Youth and Children’s and Leaders’ Seminars were organised by Ken Read Chairman of the Coordination Group Youth & Children together with Josef Zenhäusern, FIS Aid & Promotion Consultant, as well as Julia Raths and Andrew Cholinski from the FIS Office.

FIS news
02/10/2013