A new sports coaching facility has been set up in response to the number of children in the Great Yarmouth area who have been affected by social isolation and inactivity during the pandemic and we are delighted to support the facility with funding for sports equipment.
Starting this summer, Engage Sports Coaching will offer school sports day camps, evening clubs and interschool competitions to encourage children to be more active and have more interaction with other children. Established by sports coach, Mathew Cooper, Mathew recognises that many children have experienced a change to activities over long periods of lockdown and have missed out on essential play and interaction with other children, which has resulted in them being disengaged and a lot less active. “Many children have lost play due to Covid and here’s our chance to help give them their childhood back. We owe it to the next generation of adults.”
Mathew is also a PE teacher at a SEN school for children with special educational needs and disabilities and wants to make Engage Sports Coaching as inclusive as possible, with children from both SEN and mainstream schools: “If we can try to bridge the gap between the two, that would be perfect.”
Mathew hopes that even children who are not so sports-minded at school will enjoy the activities in a different environment and that the interaction with children from different backgrounds and abilities will promote empathy, confidence, teamwork and leadership. “They’re giving us their time and if there’s something they want to learn, we’ll try to make that happen for them. The funding will give us the opportunity to offer a wider variety of sports to engage more children.”
Due to current Covid restrictions, summer holiday sports camps will be available for pupils from Ormesby Junior School and Caister Junior School this year. As the restrictions are lifted, more children from other schools can get involved. Mathew hopes to make the facility accessible to as many children as possible and hopes to offer reduced prices to help more families access the resource.
Mathew said “We want to be more than just a sports club. We want children to have the choice of doing something more constructive [than playing computer games, for example] when they come home from school. We want to engage as many people as we can, challenging children to turn their energy into a sense of leadership and community.”
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We wish Engage Sports Coaching every success for the future and look forward to seeing their progress along the way.
If you are part of an amazing sport or leisure team and would like to apply for up to £500 of funding, we are taking applications for awarding in September 2021.
