Safe Sport Allies: Safeguarding children from violence and abuse in local sport clubs

Background The consequences of experiencing harassment and abuse (i.e. physical, psychological, sexual, neglect) in sport as a child cannot be underestimated. In many testimonials, the lack of bystanders intervening is astonishing. Bystanders are individuals who are not involved in the situation, but can negatively or positively influence the situation. Safe Sport Allies aimed at tackling harassment and abuse in grassroots sport clubs by developing, implementing and testing bystander interventions. Objectives The objectives were fourfold: 1) developing bystander interventions for sport participants, coaches, and parents, and developing a policy and implementation trajectory for club administrators; 2) developing a measurement toolkit for monitoring and evaluating the sport club safety and bystander culture; 3) longitudinally testing the effectiveness of the bystander interventions for sport participants and coaches; and 4) disseminating the findings and developed Safe Sport Allies materials. Implementation The Safe Sport Allies bystander intervention for sport participants and coaches was pilot tested in 8 grassroots sport clubs in Flanders (Belgium). The interventions were adapted and subsequently implemented in 46 sport clubs in Flanders and 4 clubs in the Netherlands. These 50 clubs followed at least one trajectory (i.e. sport participants, coaches, club administrators or parents). A total of 290 sport participants, 163 coaches, 34 club administrators and 73 parents were reached. Achievements Among sport participants and coaches, the bystander interventions proved to be effective in increasing knowledge, positive attitudes, and intentions to display positive sport participant and coach bystander behaviors immediately after the intervention. Parents positively evaluated the webinar about safe sport environments. Lastly, club administrators received a tailor-made advisory report to improve their safeguarding policy.