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Leeds Beckett project to help develop the coaches of children across Europe
Following a successful bid, Leeds Beckett and the ICCE have secured significant Erasmus+ European funding for an exciting new project entitled ‘iCoachKids: Innovative Education & Training for a Specialist Children & Youth Coaching Workforce’.
iCoachKids will take place between September 2016 and August 2019 and is a partnership of six organisations – each experts in the field of youth sport and coach education. The project will be led by Leeds Beckett and the ICCE, and also includes the Netherlands Olympic Committee (NOC*NSF), the Hungarian Coaching Association, Sport Ireland, Lithuanian Sports University (LSU), Universidad Europea de Madrid and the Royal Belgian Football Association.
The main objective of the iCoachKids project is to tackle the lack of existing opportunities for coaches of children to be suitably trained and recognised across Europe. The project will overturn this situation through the development of open and innovative education and training resources and opportunities for youth coaches.
As Project Leader,Leeds Beckett Senior Research Fellow, Sergio Lara-Bercial explained: “This project has been on our minds for a number of years. We are absolutely delighted to have secured Erasmus+ funding to make it a reality. Coaches of children represent over 80% of the coaching workforce across Europe, yet they lack sufficient opportunities to gain specialist knowledge to fulfil their very important role and I’m confident that iCoachKids will help to change that.”
iCoachKids will use a learner-centred, collaborative approach which maximises the most advanced techniques of open-source e-learning in the shape of three newly developed Massive Open Online Courses (MOOCs) and an interactive online platform.
iCoachKids will also provide tools to facilitate the creation of effective partnerships between social partners, companies and VET providers to provide more work-based education and training opportunities for coaches of children.