From playground to podium, making sport safer for participants at all levels of engagement has been a lifelong endeavour for Julie Stevens.
With increased attention turned to addressing Canada's safe sport crisis and a new year of school sports about to kick off, the Brock University Professor of Sport Management says the time is right to further emphasize the importance of safe sport practices.
"Establishing clear expectations, promoting accountability and cultivating participant well-being helps to foster a more positive and inclusive sport environment," says Stevens. "Creating a culture of safe sport allows all participants to have the opportunity to participate and flourish in environments free from abuse and maltreatment."
Safety has not always been a priority in Canadian sport, but Stevens believes that is now shifting.
The Canadian sport system was a leader in establishing the national coach certification program and long-term athlete development, she says, which had a positive influence on sport development in other countries. The Future of Sport in Canada Commission was also established in 2023 to address systemic safety issues in the Canadian sport landscape.
She says Canada now has a responsibility to match the progress of other countries and become a leader in the global safe sport movement.
"I believe stakeholders throughout the sport ecosystem face one major obstacle the challenge of change," she says. "Through education, we can improve capacity to ensure safe sport experiences for all."
Overcoming resistance to change will require fostering a climate that encourages decision-makers at all levels of sport to support the creation and implementation of new safe sport practices in their organizations.
Stevens says open education resources (OER) that are widely accessible and collaborative in nature can be particularly effective in providing sport leaders with relevant and practical tools to better understand and implement safe sport practices.
Her recently released Safe Sport: Critical Issues and Practices (Second Edition) is a free OER that aims to expand conversations about creating a safer, more inclusive sport sector in Canada.
"Given safe sport is a dynamic, evolving issue, an open education approach is a very effective way to support leaders and continuously cultivate awareness," she says.
Edited by Stevens, the comprehensive collection of 23 chapters written by 27 contributors draws on a broad range of knowledge grounded in athlete experiences, academic research and case studies from professionals and volunteers across the sport system.
The ebook is intended to inform, educate and empower various stakeholders including athletes, coaches, officials, guardians, volunteers and administrators to take meaningful action toward safe sport.
The expanded second edition of Safe Sport also reflects ongoing conversations in the world of sports. New chapters focus on safe sport in high-performance settings, within equity-deserving groups such as Para athletes, novel coaching models and organizational case studies.
Looking beyond safe sport practices with a punitive approach, it also offers a proactive lens of safeguarding, including building awareness and trust among sport stakeholders within communities. Safeguarding highlights the importance of putting the needs of participants at the forefront and empowering sport leaders towards action rather than reaction.
In her research and advocacy work, Stevens draws on her lifetime of experience as a hockey player, coach, official, parent and board member.
As an educator, she also hopes the resource will help to equip young people involved in sport with the tools to enact positive change.
"It is this generation of students who represent the next generation of parents and sport leaders who play a key role in achieving safe sport goals," she says.
