IOC Young Leader Isaiah Kioiloglou: Promoting social inclusion for women with disabilities through sport
05 September 2024 – International Olympic Committee (IOC) Young Leader Isaiah Kioiloglou is aiming to create social change through goalball, one of the sports that fans are enjoying at the Paralympic Games Paris 2024. Here, Kioiloglou explains more about her project, the Cycle of Femmability, how it benefits women with disabilities, and the potential impact of the Paralympic Games.
Isaiah Kioiloglou’s determination to promote social inclusion was first ignited during childhood. As well as growing up in a refugee family in Greece, Kioiloglou witnessed first-hand the challenges faced by her aunt with a disability.
She is now working hard to create employment opportunities for women with disabilities through her project, “The Cycle of Femmability”.
“I saw how my family had to adapt in order to support my aunt,” Kioiloglou says. “Society was not ready to welcome my aunt into the world, so my family had to do that for her. This situation really inspired me to create long-lasting social change. The Cycle of Femmability is dedicated to my grandmother and my family, who were my aunt’s only support system.”
As a freelance soft skills trainer, Kioiloglou developed the project in two phases. In the first phase, the initiative employs goalball – a team sport specifically designed for athletes with visual impairments – as a means of teaching soft skills to organisations’ employees through targeted workshops. In the second phase, these workshops are led by women with disabilities who have been trained by Kioiloglou, offering them valuable employment opportunities and promoting their inclusion in society.
In Greece, one in five women has a disability, and the employment rate in this group is 31.1 per cent, among the lowest in the European Union. There is evidently a need for the Cycle of Femmability in Kioiloglou’s home country.
Support from the IOC Young Leaders Programme
Kioiloglou was selected for the IOC Young Leaders Programme as part of the 2023-2026 cohort, giving her the opportunity to develop the Cycle of Femmability.
“The IOC Young Leaders Programme was ideal for me,. The training provided is so helpful. They are helping us slowly but surely secure a sustainable social business, as we have access to experienced mentors, lecturers and people who are there to support us, including the programme’s head managers. The whole experience wouldn’t be the same without them. Besides that, a very important part is seeing how people do it in other countries. We share the experience of being entrepreneurs in different cultures. It’s really amazing.”
Isaiah Kioiloglou, IOC Young Leader
Kioiloglou has a long-term association with the Olympic Movement, having undergone a transformative experience as a teenager at an International Olympic Truce Centre sport-for-development camp. At 19, she was chosen to participate in the Youth Leadership Camp of the United Nations’ Office on Sport for Development and Peace, before being selected for six consecutive years as a Young Delegate for the European Organisation for Grassroots Sport (ENGSO) Youth, which aims to promote the rights of young people in the grassroots sport sector, and last year she was elected to the Youth Committee.
Kioiloglou is delighted to have the opportunity to continue this work as an IOC Young Leader.
“I feel that everything that I have done in my past, regarding my work experiences, led me to this moment,” she says.
Teaching the common language of Olympism
Goalball is one of the 22 sports at the Paralympic Games Paris 2024, and Kioiloglou is hopeful that its appearance on such a prominent stage will change the perception of athletes with disabilities.
“Goalball is one of the two Paralympic sports that does not have an Olympic counterpart, so this sport can really attract its own kind of audience,” she says.
“Sports fans are often drawn to new and different experiences, and this curiosity can translate into increased viewership. People tune in to understand and appreciate the game for what it truly is, without distinguishing between people based on disability.
“This is something that is really important and valuable. We hope the goalball tournament will create its own atmosphere, its own precedent, its own culture, and fans won’t really see disability, but true sport.”
Kioiloglou was given the opportunity to volunteer in the French capital for the Olympic Games. As she witnessed history take place and felt grateful to celebrate Greece’s medals with the Hellenic Olympic Committee, she learned a lesson which she has taken back to Greece and will try to apply to the Cycle of Femmability.
“The most valuable thing I learned is seeing up close the common language of Olympism. We all understand what it is, regardless of culture, background or belief. We all strive for it, and we can all develop ourselves through it. In the pursuit of this shared mission, we all stand as equals.”
Isaiah Kioiloglou, IOC Young Leader
“This is exactly how we want to inspire women with disabilities in Greek society through my project. We all have differences. But if we truly believe in a shared and common vision, and see the differences as something that unites us, then we can all be equal. What is the vision of the Cycle of Femmability? A world where everyone is valued based on their skills, regardless of gender or disability.”
IOC Young Leaders Programme contributing to Olympism 365 days a year
Launched in 2016, the IOC Young Leaders Programme empowers young people to leverage the power of sport to make a positive difference in their communities. The programme contributes to Olympism365, the IOC’s approach to using sport as an important enabler of the UN Sustainable Development Goals, and specifically to Olympism365’s innovation portfolio, which aims to identify, sustain and scale innovative sports-based approaches that deliver concrete impact in targeted communities.
With the support of the IOC, Worldwide Olympic and Paralympic Partner Panasonic and a network of mentors, these inspiring young people have so far delivered over 160 sport-led projects promoting education and livelihoods, equality and inclusion, health, peace building and sustainability, directly benefitting more than 37,000 people.
Learn more about the IOC Young Leaders Programme and the Olympism365 strategy, and sign up for the “IOC Young Leaders in Action” newsletter to get the latest updates.
