Case Studies from Italy – SportWay 2025, Possagno
In May 2025, the picturesque town of Possagno, nestled in the foothills of the Veneto region and renowned for its cultural heritage, became the epicenter of a transformative, evidence-informed sports initiative: SportWay Italy 2025 – 6InSuperAbile. This two-day inclusive event, rooted in principles of universal design, inclusive pedagogy, and community-based participation, mobilized over 1,000 participants of all ages and abilities.
Far beyond a simple sports gathering, the event represented a living laboratory of inclusive practice, where local sports clubs assumed a pivotal role as agents of social innovation and drivers of intersectoral collaboration. Their direct engagement with schools, social cooperatives, and families created a multi-layered ecosystem of inclusion, combining sport, education, and cultural accessibility.
Through a range of adaptive and mixed-ability disciplines, facilitated by trained professionals and peer volunteers, SportWay Italy showcased how sport can be leveraged as a tool for social cohesion, emotional well-being, and civic empowerment. The event adopted a participatory and experiential methodology, allowing for embodied learning, empathy-building, and mutual recognition among participants.
Most notably, the initiative demonstrated the capacity of grassroots sport organisations to operationalise inclusive values—not only by ensuring physical access and safety, but by cultivating a welcoming environment where each individual, regardless of ability, could experience agency, belonging, and dignity.
As a result, 6InSuperAbile offered a scalable and replicable model of community-based inclusive sport intervention, aligned with the objectives of both the European Strategy for the Rights of Persons with Disabilities (2021–2030) and the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs)—particularly SDG 3 (Good Health and Well-Being), SDG 4 (Quality Education), and SDG 10 (Reduced Inequalities).
Participating Sports Clubs – SportWay Italy 2025:
- Pedemontana Volley
- Sportlife Montebelluna
- Sporting Life Centre
- Asolo Golf Club
- Oltre le Parole
- Intelligenza Animale Associazione
- Basketball School
- A.S.D. Karate Club Kanazawa
- Mine Vaganti
- Lupastri
- Padova Mixed Ability
- Lupi del Cansiglio
- Dragons
- 4Volponi
- Canguri d’Acciaio
- Il Branco
- Dolomitici
- I Passeri
- AnfassTV Blu Olimpia Postioma
- Ala Autismo Roncade
- VSP DiversAbili Vigontina
- Gruppo Sportivo Dinamis Paese
- VIP Clown
- A.S.D. Sport ASSI
- A.S.D. Arcieri del Piave
- UOEI Paratletica
- Abi Rugby
A Local Event with a European Soul
Co-funded by the European Union through the Erasmus+ programme, SportWay Italy 2025 – 6InSuperAbile exemplified the power of transnational cooperation in fostering inclusive practices through sport. The Italian edition, held in Possagno, brought together partners from Italy, Slovenia, and Austria, with a shared mission: to explore and expand the role of sport as a vector of equity, participation, and community resilience.
At the very core of the event were 27 local sports associations, whose involvement extended far beyond the operational realm. These organisations were not merely service providers—they were co-designers of inclusive pedagogical frameworks, actively contributing to the redefinition of sporting norms and to the deconstruction of ableist paradigms that often exclude individuals with disabilities or those from marginalized backgrounds.
By employing adapted sport methodologies, flexible rule systems, and person-centred coaching strategies, the clubs enabled mixed-ability participation in a wide range of disciplines. Their role encompassed both technical facilitation and social mediation, ensuring psychological safety, affective engagement, and peer recognition for every participant.
Crucially, these clubs acted as local engines of social innovation, promoting inclusive physical literacy—defined as the motivation, confidence, physical competence, and understanding to value and take responsibility for engagement in physical activities for life, regardless of one’s ability. By embracing intergenerational volunteering, peer mentoring, and universal design for learning (UDL), they helped foster an environment of mutual empowerment where diversity was celebrated as an asset rather than a challenge.
The Italian event thus demonstrated that grassroots sports clubs, when embedded in a supportive ecosystem and linked through transnational frameworks such as Erasmus+, can become powerful drivers of bottom-up change. In doing so, they not only enable access to sport, but also reframe sport itself as a participatory, inclusive, and transformative experience.
Inclusion in Action: The Role of Local Sports Clubs
From adaptive archery and para-karate to baskin (a structured form of inclusive basketball) and pet therapy, the local sports clubs involved in SportWay Italy 2025 – 6InSuperAbile did more than deliver athletic activities: they cultivated intentional environments of psychosocial inclusion, relational accessibility, and intercorporeal learning.
Each discipline was carefully modified to respond to a spectrum of functional diversities, including physical, sensory, cognitive, and relational disabilities. The adaptations went beyond equipment or space—they included instructional scaffolding, role-differentiated participation models, and the co-creation of rules to ensure equity of engagement rather than merely equality of access. This methodological approach aligns with current best practices in inclusive physical education and reflects the principles of universal design in sport.
Notably, clubs such as Padova Mixed Ability, Abi Rugby, and ASD Arcieri del Piave emerged as exemplars of inclusive sport leadership. These organisations didn’t just offer training; they enacted a model of transformational coaching, whereby the athlete is supported not only in technical progression but also in identity development, self-efficacy, and group belonging.
Their work included:
- training and mentoring peer volunteers (both adolescent and adult),
- facilitating inter-ability team dynamics,
- and creating non-competitive and low-anxiety spaces where emotional safety was prioritised alongside physical activity.
A particularly symbolic moment of the event was the awarding of the Fair Play Cup to the Abi Rugby team, a mixed-ability group whose members—athletes with and without disabilities—embodied the event’s core values of intersubjective respect, mutual encouragement, and ethical sport conduct. Their presence on the field dismantled hierarchical models of ability and demonstrated a relational ethic of care in practice.
This recognition was not only a celebration of sportsmanship but a pedagogical act, highlighting how inclusive sports clubs function as agents of cultural change, challenging dominant narratives about disability, competence, and social worth. Through their example, they reframed sport as a shared social ritual—where participation itself becomes a form of recognition and inclusion becomes not an add-on, but the starting point.
Building Bridges Beyond Sport
The contribution of local sports clubs during SportWay Italy 2025 – 6InSuperAbile extended far beyond the facilitation of athletic activities. These organisations acted as intermediary bodies capable of bridging traditionally siloed sectors—namely, sport, education, welfare, and culture—thus promoting a multidimensional model of inclusion grounded in interagency collaboration and community-based participatory approaches.
In alignment with the ecological systems theory of development (Bronfenbrenner, 1979), the event was structured to involve multiple layers of influence, from microsystems (e.g., peer groups and families) to mesosystems (e.g., partnerships between schools and clubs), generating a synergistic inclusion framework. Local clubs collaborated with:
- educational institutions (from primary to upper secondary level),
- social cooperatives offering disability support and community care,
- and regional cultural institutions committed to accessible heritage and learning.
Together, they co-designed and facilitated educational workshops, creative laboratories, and inclusive cultural experiences, ensuring that inclusion was not limited to the sports field but permeated the entire learning ecosystem of the event. These activities were informed by experiential education theories and emphasised embodied learning, cognitive flexibility, and creative expression as tools for identity development and social inclusion.
A key enabler of this cross-sectoral impact was the mobilisation of over 80 volunteers, a significant portion of whom were recruited directly from the local sports associations. These individuals—ranging from experienced adult volunteers to youth peer mentors—were trained in inclusive facilitation, empathic communication, and basic intercultural mediation. Their responsibilities extended across domains, including:
- participant orientation and mobility support,
- language translation for international delegates,
- relational scaffolding for participants with psychosocial vulnerabilities,
- and documentation and dissemination support.
The presence and commitment of these volunteers exemplified the transformative potential of grassroots civic engagement, highlighting how volunteering, when structurally integrated and ethically framed, can serve as a linchpin between bottom-up community energy and top-down institutional objectives. In doing so, local clubs not only facilitated inclusion but also modelled a culture of care, solidarity, and intergenerational learning—core values for any inclusive ecosystem.
Ultimately, these bridges built “beyond sport” affirmed the concept that inclusive events must be intersectional, and that the sustainability of such models depends on the horizontal cooperation among actors who share a commitment to equity, dignity, and full participation.
Lessons for Europe: A Model to Replicate
The experience of SportWay Italy 2025 – 6InSuperAbile demonstrates with clarity that the implementation of inclusive sports practices does not hinge on large-scale financial resources, but rather on localized social capital, adaptive capacity, and a shared sense of ownership among stakeholders. The Italian model underscores that when local sports clubs are empowered, adequately networked, and institutionally recognized, they evolve into community anchors—capable of catalysing social cohesion, identity formation, and intergenerational solidarity.
This place-based approach to inclusion resonates strongly with the European Union’s emphasis on decentralised, participatory models of governance and aligns with the Council of Europe’s Charter on Sport for All, which promotes accessibility, respect for diversity, and community engagement as pillars of democratic sport ecosystems.
The Possagno event also offered critical insights for European replication and scalability. International delegates from Slovenia and Austria—both partner countries within the SportWay consortium—explicitly acknowledged the Italian edition as a best practice case due to:
- the seamless integration of sport, education, and social services;
- the use of mixed-ability models in both competitive and non-competitive contexts;
- and the structured involvement of both volunteers and professionals in inclusive facilitation.
The Italian framework provided a compelling demonstration of how intersectoral alignment—among clubs, schools, cooperatives, municipalities, and cultural institutions—can enable inclusive infrastructure without the need for specialised facilities. This aligns with the logic of resourcefulness and network activation, increasingly central in European cohesion policy and social innovation frameworks.
Fundamentally, SportWay Italy 2025 revealed that local sports clubs, when positioned as relational hubs and not merely as technical providers, can become catalysts of trust, recognition, and transformation. Their roles extend beyond traditional coaching to encompass emotional mediation, empowerment facilitation, and community bridge-building—functions that are vital in contexts of increasing social fragmentation and youth disconnection.
As European institutions and local governments seek to enhance inclusive participation in sport, the Italian case offers a methodologically sound, emotionally resonant, and operationally feasible blueprint. In Possagno, inclusion was not a theme—it was a lived experience, enacted through movement, dialogue, care, and celebration. The event did not simply talk about inclusion—it rendered it visible, tangible, and replicable.
At the origin of this impact were not abstract strategies, but the commitment of local sports clubs—organisations that believed, deeply and practically, that sport is a right, not a privilege, and that every body has a place in the game.
“When sport becomes a language everyone can speak, communities stop excluding and start belonging.”
