Member Spotlight Series: Christine Granger
Name: Christine Granger
Pronouns: She/Her
Email: christine@proud2play.org.au
LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/christine-granger-99b855196/
Areas of Interest: Diversity & Inclusion, Sport for development, Research into practice, Physical activity of marginalised communities
Organisation/Employer/University: Proud2Play
Project/Media/Research links you’d like to share:
The Rainbow Roadmap is a 5 step process that supports organisations to become rainbow ready: https://www.proud2play.org.au/rainbow-roadmap.
Parklife is a social outreach program that uses trained community facilitators to deliver social sport in community spaces. Whilst this project has been heavily impacted by COVID-19 lockdowns it will re-launch in November 2021 https://www.proud2play.org.au/parklife. Research conducted by our co-founder Dr Ryan Storr and others in the field can be found via the following link: https://www.proud2play.org.au/research
Are you looking to collaborate? Yes
I am open to collaborating with:
☒ Practitioners (e.g. exercise physiologists, town planners etc.)
☒ Policy (e.g. particular state/federal department)
☒ Research (e.g. fields of interest)
☒ Other (please specify)
Please provide more detail about the box(es) you checked:
I am open to connecting with anyone who has an interest in this space. From a research perspective, there is very little data about how LGBTIQ+ folks are physically active so I would be keen to connect and discuss this gap in the data.
About You
My favourite way to be active on the weekend:
Hiking or any outdoor sport such as kayaking
How you became involved in PA:
I have been active my whole life. My Dad always played sport and I grew up on an estate with a lot of kids so we were always out playing various games from football (soccer) to skateboarding to climbing trees. Whilst I was active at school in PE and during breaks through playing football, I was not allowed to join the football team until my last year of primary school because I was a girl and “girls didn’t play football”. At secondary school, I loved PE it was something I was good at. I always opted for outdoor education for end of year activity week but when it came to school sport we had to fight to get a girls football team so that did not happen straight away. To compete at a higher level I had to travel 2 hours on a bus on a Friday night to train because there were no high level women’s teams any closer. At university I made the choice to combine my love of sport and recreation with my passion for development and studied Sport for Development with PA (BA Hons). Being active continued as part of the course and I was able to join the university football team!
This is what I do…
I am the CEO of Proud2Play. We are a not for profit organisation whose purpose is to enhance the opportunities for LGBTIQ+ communities to lead active and healthy lifestyles in affirming and inclusive environments through the power of sport and recreation.
….so that…
Others don’t have to feel the way I did about who they are, see that being physically active is an option for them when for so long it has not been a safe space for our communities and can experience the benefits that being active bring.
