The Scottish Handball Association is hosting an International Conference on Wednesday and Thursday (28-29 April). The theme of the conference is “Beyond Winning and Losing: Collaborating for More Important Results” and all of the briefings and interviews can be viewed online.
- Conference Website: Link
- Speakers: Link
- Schedule: Link
- Start and Stop times both days
- 1600-2000 CET
- 1500-1900 Scotland
- 1000-1400 US ET
- Start and Stop times both days
- Registration: Link
There are several interesting items on the schedule (check it out), but here are a few that I’m looking forward to seeing
- Wednesday, 28 April
- 1800 CET: How to build participation in Handball within Scottish Schools
- 1900 CET: Big Sport, Wee Countries, Big Ambition: What Scottish Handball and other ‘minority’ sports can learn from success of Faroes and Portugal in growing their game
- Thursday, 29 April
- 1600 CET: Challenges of Growing Handball: A North American perspective (with yours truly, John Ryan)
- 1930 CET: British Handball – past, present and future (with handball TV Commentator and British Handball’s Paul Bray)
Challenges of Growing Handball: A North American Perspective
A few notes on this, as it was a fun, informal discussion with yours truly and Scottish Handball’s Stephen Neilson. We covered several topics including the following:
- How the U.S. and other English speaking countries have tried to varying degrees of success to capitalize on Olympic Opportunities
- Whether the need to field competitive national teams can be a “distraction” that negatively impacts grass roots development
- Which English speaking nation might be best on track for a “breakthrough” in the handball world
- How the current U.S. reliance on dual citizens might impact stateside development… (My perspective might surprise you)
The conference is free and available to all who register.