University lecturer to speak on women and sport leadership at national forum
A UNIVERSITY of Chichester academic has been named as a guest speaker at a major national forum for his efforts to raise awareness of the issues facing women in sport.
Senior lecturer Dr Jordan Matthews will present his perspective on what more can be done to develop the role of women across sport at the Westminster Media Forum in London. The conference, on Thursday 10 May, includes elite figures from the world of sport who will consider plans to improve gender equality in leadership and decision making across the UK.
Dr Matthews, from the department of Sport Development and Management, will join notable spokeswomen including Dame Katherine Grainger, chair of UK Sport and a gold medal-winner at the London 2012 Olympics. Speakers also include BBC Sport director Barbara Slater and Annamarie Phelps, chair of British Rowing and vice-chair of the British Paralympic Association.
“The seminar will address inequality in leadership and the workforce, which is a particularly topical issue as UK Sport have recently set a target of at least 30 per cent gender diversity on boards for all sporting organisations in receipt of public funding, and, the International Olympic Committee have just released their gender equality recommendations too,” said Dr Matthews. “I’ll be using my experience at Chichester and research being conducted with my two PhD students, Lucy Piggott and Lombe Mwambwa, to make sense of what this means for women in sport.”
Among the guest speakers of the conference are Katie Brazier, Head of Women’s Leagues and Competitions at the FA, and Julie Harrington, CEO of British Cycling, who will assess the future role of women in shaping sports policy. Such contemporary issues are also being addressed by Dr Matthews through his work at the University of Chichester which, since 2010, has included documenting the origins, developments and outcomes of women and sport advocacy organisations from around the world.
The University, through collaborations with Females Achieving Brilliance and the Anita White Foundation, hosts the Women’s Sport Leadership Academy (WSLA) conference each year to develop future leaders of sport. The event, a residential programme held in June, invites women from across the world representing national and international sport federations, Olympic and Paralympic committees, and sport for development organisations.
To find out more about Dr Jordan Matthews’ research into developing opportunities for women across sport go to www.chi.ac.uk/staff/dr-jordan-matthews or, alternatively, for more about his seminar at the Westminster Media Forum visit www.westminsterforumprojects.co.uk/conference/women-and-sport-18.
