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The National Programme "Aristotle - CyFIT" is the largest evaluation of the physical fitness of school-age children and adolescents that has been carried out in Cyprus, which has been integrated in the "National Strategy for Sport" and more specifically in the pillar "Social dimension of sport with the main objective of citizens' health".
The implementation of the "Aristotle - CyFIT" programme is part of the actions that Member States are invited to organise through the Council of Europe Recommendation of 26 November 2013 "on the promotion of physical activity for health improvement in all areas". In addition, it is part of the framework of relevant recommendations of the World Health Organization (WHO) on Health Enhancing Physical Activity (HEPA) as well as the framework for monitoring the implementation of HEPA policies by MS through the EU HEPA Focal Points Network.
The scope of the project "Aristotle - CyFIT" is based on European actions and practices in order to assess the physical fitness of children from different European countries. The European actions are carried out by applying weighted and repeated fitness tests, which aim to promote physical activity, health and well-being in schools and enable the creation of an extensive database for long-term monitoring of the fitness of children and adolescents.
The "Aristotle - CyFIT" project aims to assess the important parameters of physical fitness and physical composition indicators of the student population of secondary schools, high schools and technical schools in Cyprus, i.e. the entire student population. The duration of the project is from January 2022 - January 2025, i.e. for 36 months, for 3 phases corresponding to each academic year. Measurements will be made using weighted, reliable, valid and comparable tests, using the Eurofit fitness test battery (Council of Europe, 1988) and is widely used to assess the fitness of children and adolescents. The tests and anthropometric measurements will be carried out by the PE teacher(s) in the context of the lesson and using specific equipment with the same specifications for all school units. At the same time, it is planned to assess eating habits and physical activity levels using weighted procedures, using electronic questionnaires. This will allow you to correlate with key parameters of your lifestyle and quality of life and build up a fuller picture of the health and well-being of . All appropriate measures will be taken to protect your personal data when evaluating and publishing the data. The survey data will be held on servers at the Department for Education, Sport and Youth, and will be used anonymously for the purposes of the evaluation.
