Catherine Carty
International Women's Day: Catherine Carty, IT Tralee, Project Manager for the UNESCO Chair ‘Transforming the lives of People with Disabilities their Families and Communities in Physical Education, Sport, Fitness & Recreation’.
The work of the Chair ranges from policy to practice and has a global remit. The Chair has opened doors and created an opportunity to change the global landscape as it addresses disability inclusion in and through sport. The UNESCO Chair under Catherine's leadership coordinates a global consortium advancing the inclusive specific policy actions of the Kazan Action Plan, this has representation from UN agencies, Multilateral agencies, State Parties, Sports Bodies, Academic Networks, NGOs and Civil Society Organisations, including UNESCO, UNDESA, UN Women, UNICEF, WHO, ILO, the Commonwealth Secretatiat, the International Olympic Committee, Paralympic Committee, Special Olympics Internation, Deaflympics and more. Under this action the world first set of reporting tools and templates on sport and human rights has been developed and the support of UN treaty bodies and state parties on the use of these tools has been leveraged.
Catherine sits on the 2020 WHO Guidelines Development Group, where she Chairs the Disability subgroup for the new guidelines for Physical Activity. Catherine has also worked with WHO on the monitoring mechanism for the Global Action Plan on Physical Activity. In addition, Catherine sits on the steering committee, advisory group and technical committee working on Measuring the Contribution of Sport, Physical Education and Physical Activity to the Sustainable Development Goals. She is also on the Advisory Council of the Centre for Sport and Human Rights and the steering committee for UNESCOs global Survey on Physical Education. Catherine is research active and is currently supervising a Masters by Research project looking at how Multilateral Development Bank products can be leveraged in the area of sport. By Invitation of the Asian Development Bank she has delivered sessions at the Banks forum on Non-Communicable Diseases in Manila as well as at the World Urban Forum in Bangkok.
Catherine has coordinated IT Tralee sessions in the UN Geneva, UNESCO Paris, UN New York and has spoken at the World Conference of Sports Ministers, the World Urban Forum, the Convention on the Rights of Persons With Disabilites Conference of State Parties, the Human Rights Social Forum, the African Regional Meeting on Kazan Action Plan Implementation and many other events across 5 continents over the last year. In 2019, Catherine, on behalf of her team, was the proud recipient of the American Chamber of Commerce Ireland/ Royal Irish Academy Research Innovation Award for Higher Education, for the UNESCO Chair project UFIT (Universal Fitness Innovation and Transformation). The Chair has opened doors and put IT Tralee on a very global map, Catherine is keen to leverage the opportunity that presents to level the playing field for all our benefit."
