Canadian sport organizations team up to create the Gender Equity Playbook

They’re calling it the Gender Equity Playbook.

Canadian Women & Sport has announced their partnership with six multisport service organizations (MSOs) and national sport organizations (NSOs) to pilot and support the development of the playbook. Sport for Life is proud to be on that list.

“Gender equity doesn’t happen without groups working together. It requires proactive  action with leaders in the sport system to recruit, promote, support, champion and celebrate  the success of all women in the system,” said Carolyn Trono, Director of Quality Sport.

“By working with  Canadian Women and Sport, we  will learn if additional steps could be taken to provide a better environment to support women in our organization. This  could involve policy changes, shifts in our expectations of how people work, and it will likely require all team members to be conscious of how their  words and actions impact others.”

Over the next year, Alpine Canada, Athletics Canada, Rowing Canada Aviron, Canada Snowboard and Baseball Canada, as well as Sport for Life will be working with  Candian Women & Sport to undertake the three Playbook steps: an eLearning module, an assessment and an action planning service. The Gender Equity Playbook will be a capacity-building program to help organizations apply a gender lens to their day to day decision-making.

“When the first Sport for Life document was published in 2005, we identified that male and female athletes have unique pathways. Over the years we have worked with Canadian Women & Sport and many talented women to improve the quality of the female sport experience,” said CEO Richard Way.

“As we have developed as an organization, we have always been conscious of equity, diversity, inclusion and accessibility, so we’re excited at the opportunity to work with Canadian Women & Sport on our Gender Equity Playbook as we always seek to continually improve.”

Canadian Women & Sport is excited to start that work. 

“We firmly believe that sport organizations are made better through gender equity and we are delighted that these six partners have made such a strong commitment to change, not just for themselves but for the sport system as a whole,” said Allison Sandmeyer-Graves, CEO of Canadian Women & Sport.

“This pilot process will ensure that the Playbook moves us towards our goal of making equitable sport a reality for women and girls in Canada.”