The sixth edition of the National Erasmus Games (NEG) will take place from the 12th to the 14th of April in the city of Parma.

 

This year as well Erasmus Student Network Italy will be promoting the culture of healthy lifestyle and sport, with its educational, associative and integrating values, through the National Erasmus Games, a national sport event which will welcome more than 300 exchange students, coming from all over Italy.

 

Structured similarly to real Erasmus Olympics, the NEG will see the students from sections of the Italian network challenging each other in the different sports disciplines set out for the games (soccer, volleyball and basketball) wearing the colours of the city in which they are spending their mobility experience instead of those of their home country.

 

The NEG are also the national stage of the ESN Italy project "Erasmus and Sport" whose goal is, since 2013, to spread the culture of practising one or more sports disciplines among mobility students during their exchange period, aiming to build a sense of community and cultural closeness among foreign students and Italian ones, thanks to the educational bridge created by sport, because - quoting the Olympic athlete Fiona May - this is "an environment in which everything is easier", even overcoming the national and linguistic borders.

 

For this edition too, the National Erasmus Games will have the patronage of the Italian National Olympic Committee (CONI), the University of Parma, the City of Parma, the Emilia Romagna Region, the CUS of Parma, the European Commission, the National Youth Forum (FNG), the National Agency for the Youth, the National Agency for the Erasmus+ INDIRE, Pernod Ricard and Cariparma Foundation, corporations that represent a significant goal for the association and a crucial moment for the construction of a solid collaboration and an open dialogue with the institutions.

 

Following the directives of the European Union and of the Erasmus+ programme for the promotion of sports, Erasmus Student Network Italy has always invested its efforts in the organisation of local and national sports events and projects with the aim of creating big moments of social and cultural integration for the international students living in our country.

 

But ESN Italy doesn't stop to these goals and it aims even higher: during the NEG, another international project will be implemented, ExchangeAbility, through which for years our national network has wanted to prove that Erasmus and sport are accessible to everyone. A second, equally important project implemented in this year’s edition, is SocialErasmus, through the involvement of young refugees living in the area.

 

A first Press Conference will be held on April 5th, in the municipality of Parma, while the Opening Press Conference of the event will take place in the University of Parma on Friday, April 12th and it will involve the students, the NEG Organizing Committee as well as ESN Italy and City of Parma representatives.

Later on in the day, will take place the Opening Ceremony during which all the participating teams will be presented and will parade all together, divided into delegations, in a real Flag Parade, in the streets of Parma, starting from the hosting structure of the tournament, the CUS of Parma, which gave its full logistic and institutional support to the event.

 

The event will be sponsored by Responsible Party, Prozis, Sharewood, Barilla, Coop, Parmigiano Reggiano and the local partners Al Bacio, UISP Parma e Parma Calcio.