Paralympian Eliza Stankovic-Mowle wants to see more visibility for people like herself, a woman with a disability, and is hoping an AIS program can empower herself and others to continue to push for change in sport.
Subscribe now for unlimited access.
$0/
(min cost $0)
or signup to continue reading
The wheelchair racer is one of four Canberra athletes chosen for the AIS Accelerate program, alongside volleyballer Jennifer Jane Tait, cyclist Gracie Elvin and para-rower cox Renae Domaschenz.
The four are part of 22 active and retired athletes selected for the program, who represent 13 different sports and are made up of two Paralympians and 13 Olympians.
MORE IN CANBERRA SPORT:
- Why Crookwell's Emily Chalker did not retire straight after Tokyo
- X-Games wakeboard star makes his Canberra comeback
- Capitals to learn fate of points-docking appeal next week
- Two Canberra NPL referees named on FIFA's international panel
- Hit for six: Canberra United suffers one of its biggest losses in history
Stankovic-Mowle said she was drawn to the program for a number of reasons, with a big one being retaining retired female athletes in sport and further representation of women with a disability in sport and life.
"I want to see more people like myself represented and that's what I'm hoping to do. I'm a strong believer of you can't be what you can't see. It's partly one of the reasons that drew me to the program, to be able to connect with more driven women that want to create that change," she said.
"We lose these amazing female athletes that have so many transferable skills. I want to see those women stick around and with programs like this, it's nurturing and fostering that, and building upon those skills that we already have.
"Having been involved in high performance sport over the course of 20 plus years now, which is scary to say, I've seen a lot of things that I would like to see change for future generations.
"We've come a long way and the voices of women, obviously, are a part of the conversation, and women are becoming leaders in sport more and more frequently. But this is a wonderful opportunity for women to get together and learn not only from some incredible experts ... but also each other."
The program's second intake aims to support female athletes to pursue career options in sport by providing accelerated paths to leadership roles and opportunities to utilise their talent/experience in high performance in the wider sector.
It ultimately tries to prepare athletes for life away from competing.
While the 40-year-old has her eyes set on qualifying for her fourth Commonwealth Games in Birmingham this year, she already has been pro-active about opportunities off the track. With a children's book on the way named Peg Leg Pedicure.
"I took that time off [after Tokyo] to particularly focus on a few other things outside of racing and very excitingly my first book is on its way," Stankovic-Mowle said.
"Through my experiences of being a mother with a disability and having children, children's friends will ask questions such as why is your mother different? Why does she have those legs?
"This book was actually based off a true story of taking a set of prosthetic legs into the classroom and having a bit of a chat with my daughter's class. We actually stuck some glitter on them, painted them and put some little butterflies on too. We did a beautiful, beautiful, beautiful piece of art.
"What that actually gave the children was that opportunity to humanise disability, and well more than disability. We talked about differences and how some people have glasses, some people have red hair, but we're all human and we may look different to each other, but we should celebrate those differences because they make us pretty unique and pretty special."
Former Volleyroo Tait wants to instil change in her sport as well by closing the pathway knowledge gap in Australia, and hopes to learn how to execute that through the program.
She played professionally in Europe, in Asian Championship meets, Olympic qualifiers and moved to the US as a student athlete thanks to volleyball after a coach of hers showed her the pathways available.
"The fact that you can't see much of my history of sport is that most of it happened overseas. So that was a big drive to actually be part of the program, is to learn more of the sporting culture here, and other people's pathways in Australia, to make it more accessible for female athletes to do it here as well," she said.
"Thankfully, I did have coaches when I was growing up in Queensland, telling me about college opportunities, and so I was driven to go do that. I actually emailed 250 of the 300 universities that offered programs just trying to get over there."