The Athens Olympic Museum, a member of the International Olympic Museums Network and a bearer of Olympic Education, announces its cooperation with the Stavros Niarchos Foundation (SNF), in order to plan and implement the educational and social action program “Agon, an Olympic Legacy”. The mission of the program, with the SNF as the exclusive donor, is to promote and spread Olympism and to highlight the unbreakable bond between Athletics, Culture and Education, byestablishinginteractive educational facilities and activities as part of the Museum’s permanent exhibition and by creating actions both inside the museum area, as well as by planning its outward-looking initiatives.
The Stavros Niarchos Foundation (SNF), as part of its international public welfare action, which focuses on Man and the principles of education and culture, as commodities available to all, supports the work of the Athens Olympic Museum and its steps towards expanding accessibility to the history and philosophy of Olympism. The President of the Stavros Niarchos Foundation (SNF), Mr. Andreas Drakopoulos, has stated the following: “We are glad for the opportunity to support the Athens Olympic Museum, thus contributing to providing people with educational and social programs, both inside and outside the Museum, which promote and enhance values such as the common universal Olympic heritage, as well as fair play, both in sports and all other fields of life.”
The Stavros Niarchos Foundation’s (SNF) donation involves the design and equipment of educational facilities, the development of interactive exhibits simulating sports, the production of activity materials and inclusion and accessibility programs inside the Museum area, as well as the design of tools for the implementation of actions outside the Museum. The participants in the actions of the Agon Program will have the opportunity to discover the history and value of the Olympism and the Agon, the two pillars of the Program, through experiential learning, exploration and educational activities.
The Agon Program will constitute an umbrella of actions addressed to multiple audiences and age groups: to children and students, young refugees, accompanied visitors with partial or total vision handicap, to youths, families and older participant, to all those who wish to live the experience of an Olympic and Paralympic Champion, and to visitors who wish to further explore the history of Olympism at its homeland. The various actions will start to be gradually implemented in late 2021 and until the spring of 2022.
Mr. Odysseas Athanassiou, Chief Executive Officer of LAMDA Development, with whose initiative and support the Athens Olympic Museum was designed and developed, acknowledging this cooperation, has stated: “I wish to extend my warm thanks to the Stavros Niarchos Foundation (SNF) which supports with its donation the Athens Olympic Museum’s mission to spread the history and values of Olympism to an ever broader, both Greek and foreign, public of all ages. The SNF’s contribution to the fulfilment of the Athens Olympic Museum’s vision is valuable.”
Only 6 months after its inauguration, the Athens Olympic Museum, as part of its educational work, has already welcomed visitors of all ages coming from Greece, Europe, Asia and America; it has organized educational visits for school groups, young athletes clubs and groups of unaccompanied minors, and it has also hosted its first summer camp.
By implementing the Agon, an Olympic Legacy Program, the Athens Olympic Museum continues to evolve, planning to reinforce its educational aspect and the accessibility to Olympism and its history as a cultural object, by creating a set of actions, inside and outside the museum area.
