Thank you for this initiative and for providing us with an opportunity to share our knowledge and experiences. My topic, as requested, is women in sport at the competitive level, their experiences and their needs as athletes and para-athletes, as coaches, as sport science professionals, and as women leaders in the sport system.
I've been involved in competitive sport for most of my life and it's certainly shaped who I am, hopefully for the better. I've competed for Canada. I've worked in the field of sport psychology with many of our Olympic athletes and coaches through many Olympics and Paralympic Games. I've researched and published in the area of women in coaching. Before I started my graduate program, in the early eighties I led what I think was an excellent internship mentorship program for women athletes that enabled them to move into administrative positions. That program created some of our strong women leaders who are currently in the system.
On athlete participation levels, we know that women athletes are doing very well from a numbers standpoint. In 2012, we had more than 4,000 women athletes, which comprised 44% of our Olympic teams across numerous countries. At the Paralympic Games, the increase went from 44 women and 91 men in 1960, to roughly 1,500 women and 2,700 men in 2012. That's excellent news.
However, when we look at women coaches, we're still in the 11% range across all countries. In 2012, it varies from 10% to about 16%. Certainly at the high performance competitive level, the sport science professional, so exercise physiologists, sport psychologists, medical personnel, the numbers are still incredibly low. That's what is part of the environment that high performance women athletes compete and train in.
Why should we care about this? I'm hopeful that everyone around the table does care or we wouldn't be doing this. I think there are two primary reasons from my perspective. One is the significant benefits of moving and playing, and I think we all know that. I use the example of Chantal Petitclerc who had an accident at the age of 13 and ended up in a wheelchair.
What changed her life—and she would say this—was her first coach, her high school swim coach, who got her into swimming and really changed who she was, allowed her to become a very independent, and physically and psychologically strong woman, in sport and in life in general.
However, the other reason I would argue we should care is that the environment of competitive sport is still very male dominated. While our participation rates are approaching 50%, the other categories are not. I would say it's often not a comfortable environment for our women athletes, and, at worst, it's an environment of subtle ridicule. Sometimes, as I'm sure you heard from Gretchen Kerr, it's abusive, because male skills are still seen, and the physique is still seen, as the norm in women's sport, or in sport in general.
What can we do about this? Again, from Guylaine, I think you probably heard that we discussed issues and developed many solutions around Conversation 2015, which was held in Quebec City. We had six themes there. One was around women and coaching, girls' participation, and women as decision-makers.
Briefly, to think about a couple of solutions, I would suggest, increasing the number of women in leadership positions, as coaches, as leaders in our system. If we were to create mentoring programs, and we know this works—I gave a simple example a few minutes ago—we have a prototype.
Creating learning environments, etc., that would help create a supportive environment.
I will stop there.