“Lavoro di squadra” [Teamwork] contributes to the social inclusion and employability of young NEETs through sports practice and career guidance.
The participants are NEETs (Not in Employment, Education or Training), a category that in Italy includes 2.8 million young people aged 15 to 29. Among them, those who have a more difficult situation are chosen. Through sports practice, motivation, self-esteem and team spirit are given, strengthened by motivational coaching, to then guide young people to return to study or insert them into job opportunities.
The methodological starting point for the project was given by Romano Albertazzi, referring to the consolidated British experience of Street League. The whole design and methodological system were developed by ActionAid and by the partners of the first edition: ASAI, Balon Mundial and UISP. This edition was funded entirely by ActionAid Italia and carried out in Turin (in the territories of the 5 and 6 districts), in the years 2013-15 and saw the collaboration of Synergie Italia and Scuola Calcio Mercadante and the patronage of the VI District of the Municipality of Turin.
In the following years (2015-18), again in Piedmont, three editions of the project were carried out in Alba (CN), in partnership with the ORSO Cooperative and with the support of the Cassa di Risparmio di Cuneo Foundation.
The project, with the necessary adaptations to the changed context and development of the methodologies adopted, was then carried out in Bari and Reggio Calabria (2016-2019) and Milan (2017-2022), with various financing partners.
In terms of policy, the first action was to ask the Piedmont Region to take into account the learnings of the project in the implementation of the European Social Fund, in particular by dedicating specific attention to the interception of young people, establishing alliances with supply chains other than those active labour policies (primarily sports organizations) to involve and motivate the recipients and providing forms of 360 ° taking charge of the young people involved.
Subsequently, this line of work merged into an in-depth study at the national level, which resulted in a research, complete with recommendations, carried out in 2019-2020 by Secondo Welfare: The condition of NEETs and the role of Youth Guarantee.