Yale University accepts Turkish athlete

ISTANBUL

Bahar Toksoy Guidetti has become the first Turkish athlete to be accepted to Yale University’s special program on gender equality thanks to a volleyball academy she has formed with her husband, Giovanni Guidetti, Italian coach of the Turkish women’s national volleyball team.

“He [Giovanni Guidetti] started a project in disadvantaged regions to train physical education teachers and young coach candidates, targeting to change their lives with sports,” Toksoy Guidetti said, emphasizing the importance of providing equal opportunities for all children.

“They train twice a day with coaches at the national team level,” Toksoy Guidetti added.

This year, they will experience the camp life of the national team and elite athletes from around the world in a magnificent facility, she stated.

The awareness created by many successful female athletes in various branches in the country enables girls to dream, according to Toksoy Guidetti. “The main problem of girls and young women is not about dreaming, but about making these dreams come true.”

“We are trying to use the great power of sports in easing social and environmental problems to initiate a social transformation. We bring the children together with female role models who have been successful in male-dominated industries and let them learn about their experiences,” she said.

“We want every child we touch to turn into strong, brave and self-reliant young girls as well as compassionate and sensitive young women,” she added, underlining that they aim to help the girls discover their talents and interests not only in sports but also in different fields.

She also pointed out that her daughter, Alison, is her biggest source of motivation in her struggle for gender equality. “Ignoring individual steps to be taken to solve problems may cause us to lose a whole generation.”

Toksoy Guidetti, who is among 25 international role model women who pioneer gender equality and strive for the empowerment of girls, and Giovanni Guidetti were appointed as “gender equality advocates” by United Nations Development Program (UNDP) on June 1, 2020.

Claimed the CEV Challenge Cup in 2008 with the Turkish team Vakıfbank, Toksoy Guidetti took a crucial part in the journey of VakıfBank which won a total of five national and international cups in a single season in 2013.

She played for the Italian team Savino Del Bene Volley in 2015. Later continued with Turkish teams Eczacıbaşı VitrA and Fenerbahçe. She is currently playing for another Turkish team Turkish Airlines.

Giovanni Guidetti was granted a “turquoise card,” a special work and residency permit with an unlimited duration, by President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan on July 21.

He has been coaching Vakıfbank since 2008. He lifted the 2022 FIVB Women’s Club World Championship trophy on May 22, becoming “the world’s best” for the fifth time. The yellow-blacks previously won the Women’s Club World Championship in 2013, 2017, 2018 and 2021 with him.

Between 2015 and 2016, he coached the Netherlands women’s national volleyball team, leading them to silver in the 2015 European championship, bronze in the 2016 Grand Prix, and fourth in the 2016 Summer Olympics. He left in late 2016 hoping to live full-time in Istanbul and took up the coaching job for the Turkish national team.

Meanwhile, the Turkish national women’s volleyball team ranked fourth in the 2022 International Volleyball Federation’s (FIVB) Nations League.

Defeated 3-0 by Italy in the semi-finals of the organization held in Ankara Sports Hall, Türkiye lost to Serbia with the same score in the bronze medal match.