Mission : Sport 4 All

Background: Sport as a route to opportunity 

For young people on the French island of Réunion, getting into work can be a real challenge. More than 20% of young people are unemployed, and only around 30% find a job within a year of completing their initial training, compared with 62% in mainland France. 

At the same time, many young people aged 16 to 25 who are looking for work are not regularly involved in sport. This can contribute to sedentary lifestyles and can also mean missing out on the confidence, teamwork and social connections that sporting activities can build. 

The Mission Locale Sud de la Réunion wanted to try something different. Its Mission: Sport 4 All initiative aimed to use accessible, mass-participation sport as a way to support young people's personal development and their journey towards employment. 

The project focused first on the professionals who work directly with young people. By strengthening their knowledge and skills around sport, the aim was to help them develop better and more engaging opportunities for their target audience. 

Learning from job-shadowing in Tenerife 

Six professionals took part in an eight-day job-shadowing programme in Tenerife from 17 to 24 April 2024. The programme was delivered in partnership with Top Padel Granadilla, with support from French organisation La Toupie Bleue, which helped connect the group with local sports organisations and activities. 

The participants experienced a wide range of sporting environments, including surfing with Red Rock Academy, yoga with Yoga Cat, and a visit to Tenerife Top Training, a high-performance sports complex. 

The focus was not simply on watching activities. Each visit created an opportunity to exchange ideas, compare approaches and discuss how sport can develop important personal and social skills. 

The island setting was particularly relevant. Like Réunion, Tenerife is volcanic, surrounded by the sea and well suited to outdoor and water-based activities. This meant participants could easily see how ideas they discovered abroad could be adapted and used back home. 

From inspiration to action 

The mobility experience gave all six professionals a significant boost. They reported that they had benefited fully from the opportunity to observe different sports practices and learn in a new European environment. 

Just as importantly, they returned with practical ideas they could put into action. They shared what they had learned through debriefing sessions with colleagues and began organising new sporting activities locally. 

Around five to six sports initiatives were launched as a direct follow-up to the mobility experience. These activities helped bring sport into the organisation's wider work supporting young people who are distant from the labour market. 

The experience also contributed to a broader “Sport for young people” strategy, with each micro-territory developing activities that used sport as a tool for engagement and integration. This work became part of the organisation's 2025 roadmap. 

A wider impact for young people and the community 

The project's impact went beyond the six professionals who travelled to Tenerife. Their new knowledge and enthusiasm were passed on to colleagues and, most importantly, to the young people they support. 

Sport became a practical way to help young people re-engage, build confidence and develop skills. The project also supported a stronger focus on equality, participation and the values that sport can bring to social and professional development. 

The initiative raised the profile of this approach across Réunion too. Mission Locale Sud was invited several times to the Conférence Régionale du Sport, where its experience was highlighted and the importance of developing accessible sporting activities for young people was reinforced. 

Local media also promoted the organisation's sport-and-integration activities, helping more people discover the opportunities available. 

For the six professionals, the Tenerife experience was more than an eight-day mobility. It gave them new ideas, new connections and the confidence to try something different. For the organisation and its young people, it helped turn those ideas into lasting local action — showing how sport can be a simple, engaging and powerful tool for opening doors to employment and inclusion.