Introduction to Lasso Safe Certify
Setting the standard for safe sport centers, Lasso Safe has enacted the Lasso Safe Rating System and Certification, complemented by the Value Creation Plan. This system is innovative in its combined quantifying and incentivization approach to safe sport centers, as well as its inclusion of youth, amateur and professional sport centers. Under the Certification, private and organizational centers are required to achieve safe center standards in the Lasso Safe Rating System, and maximize benefit through the Value Creation Plan.
Over the last 10 years, the leaders of Lasso Safe have sought to make the communities in which we train, compete, work, dream and triumph safer, higher performance and less damaging to our sport culture. When Lasso Safe started there was no defined safe sport center movement. There was no way to know if a center was truly high performance and no agreed upon guidelines to help those who wanted to lead safe centers. Lasso Safe created the Lasso Safe sport center program as a way to measure safe centers and to provide a roadmap for developing a truly high performance culture that prospers through equality and excellence. With Lasso Safe, the Lasso Safe Certification program created a simple, metrics-based system to define what a safe center is. Lasso Safe created a baseline – a universally agreed upon holistic system of metrics for reducing emotional, physical and sexual abuse and promoting athlete safety, higher performance and expanded athletic careers. And the program was embraced by a collective group of leaders – sport psychologists, sport policy leaders, sport media, athletic champions, non-profits, sport medicine doctors, sport center owners and managers, local communities and business leaders. Lasso Safe has been researching sport centers in our communities since 2001, and today, Lasso Safe has advanced into the most widely used safe center program in the world and an international symbol of safe center leadership and sport culture excellence. People know that if they are in a Lasso Safe-certified center they are protected from bullying, nutritional deficit or body shaming, sexual harassment or abuse, false accusations and over training, and that their commitment to athletic excellence will be honored in an eco-system that encourages positive body image, bodily integrity, the athletes’ voice, high performance through collaborative strategizing, ethical business leadership and community relations while increasing economic prosperity. They also know that they are in a center that prioritizes mental and emotional wellness. As of July 2020, there are more than 350 sport centers researched, across 32 countries and territories, and more than 150 professional contributors from industries such as policy leadership, Olympic and professional athlete, psychotherapy, coaching, sport medicine, sport therapy and sport center ownership, spanning all divisions – from centers hosting multi-sport, to Olympic training and competition, to athlete-owned, to youth, and even entire complexes. And our community of Lasso Safe professionals is Championship strong, with World and Olympic Competitors on our boards. In the first decade of our existence, we have made Lasso Safe a living standard for safe sport centers. We’ve set in place the structure to help us get where we need to go. And now is the time to fully move towards the leading, performance-based certification and monitoring model we developed as Lasso Safe Certify.
Beyond requiring compliance with the Lasso Safe Rating System, Certification also requires the establishment of community and media relations, including affiliated safety centers, city leaders and digital, local and national media.
Augmenting the Lasso Safe Certification, Lasso Safe once again set the international standard for safe sport centers by passing the Gold Standard. Among other requirements, the Gold Standard requires annual safe center performance reporting using the Value Creation Reporting System and Safe Center Performance Reporting System, key components of the Value Creation Plan. All gold certified centers must be benchmarked and reported, and all certified centers have the option of maximizing their safety investment through the Value Creation Plan.
Enforcement of safety performance in Lasso Safe Certified centers is the responsibility of the Lasso Safe Directors Division and Safety Board, who will require compliance verification before issuing certification or certification renewal.
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