S4MED — Skills by Sport 4 Med

Training coaches across the Mediterranean to help young people build the skills they need for work and for starting their own ventures.

Skills by Sport 4 Med treated the coach as the point where sport becomes a route to employment, or fails to. Its purpose was to strengthen coaches’ ability to develop employability and entrepreneurship skills in their athletes, and to raise their awareness of sport itself as a way of building those skills. The Mediterranean was chosen because youth unemployment across the region is persistently high.

Research with coaches and with employers identified the gap between the skills sport develops and those the labour market asks for. The project’s toolkit for trainers then set out a five-module path: an introduction to sport, the role of the sport coach, sport for employability skills, moving from role to practice, and diversity management in sport. Delivery combined in-person and online formats with a supporting web platform, so the training could run under different national conditions.

Save the Dream took part as a project partner, working closely with Iscte – University Institute of Lisbon, and the other partners, including the Università Cattolica del Sacro Cuore, the Portuguese Coaches Confederation, the International Olympic Truce Centre, the University of the Balearic Islands, HAŠK Mladost and the Cyprus Sports Organisation.

Photo: Partners at the S4MED meeting in Milan, March 2023.

PROJECT FACTS