Stoke City Football Club’s community programme reaches out to over 350 schools in the surrounding area, aiming to help young people strive for an improved lifestyle with the help of sport. Stoke City Community Programme, having built excellent relationships with local schools and local communities, believe that by introducing young people to physical activities, they can acquire a better physical condition, which can lead to a better mental condition.
The community programme staff deliver not only football sessions to young people but are qualified to deliver a wide range of other sports such as: rugby, cricket, hockey and athletics. Through experiencing a wide range of sports, young people can develop new skills.
Building on five years of experience delivering projects such as Positive Activities for Young People (PAYP), the Community Programme Team is proud of their role in developing this unique and important ‘flag ship’ programme, aimed at supporting young people who have missed out on vital opportunities which can shape the future of their lives. Stoke Challenge has become an integral project to the Club, which staff, players and partner organisations are delighted to support.
Building on an ethos of supporting local communities, the Stoke City Community Programme has embraced the concept of the Stoke Challenge and have piloted an innovative club based Programme that aims to help local NEET Not in Employment, Education, Training young people get into employment, education, or training. Many of the young people had never previously completed any courses or like training have, over a 10 week period taken on real challenges, such as high ropes challenge, abseiling and mountain walking as well as charity fund-raising for various organisations.
By being based at Stoke City Football Club, there is no doubt the young people are benefiting from excellent facilities, which includes highly qualified and committed Club and Connexions staff; and an most significantly, an aspirational environment, which does not fail to ‘rub off’ on everyone who enters the Club.
The programme is split into two main elements, both of which encourage young people to adopt positive values into their lives. The first element includes activities that focus on learning by doing, which includes team building activities and challenges along with sports based learning, where the young people gain experience in sports leadership, first aid, fitness and exercise and adopting a healthy life style.
The second element challenges the young people’s attitude and behaviour, encouraging a positive work ethic and positive views towards learning. Negative perceptions of classrooms are challenged by introducing literacy and numeracy in an informal and supportive environment. This allows the young people to address poor classroom behaviour, anger management, basic skills, poor work ethic and negative views of learning.
All aspects of the programme reward positive behaviour and achievement, enabling the young people to begin to appreciate that hard work does pay off. Players play a role in this, as they point out for example that no matter what successes they gain on the pitch, they recognise the value of further education and training as they prepare for careers after football.
The Positive Activities for Young People programme that Stoke City Community Programme delivers sees several innovative projects including music and DJ sessions, drama workshops, art and street art workshops, sport and sports leadership sessions.
The art work shops that have seen young people be given the opportunity to participate in street art workshops. Our resident artist Neil ‘Toes’ Willis has been using art as an engagement tool that has seen some wonderful pieces of work be produced in the family area of the stadium.
Project Xtra Time
A project for young people who are Not in Education, Employment or Training (NEET) and those who do not pass Level 1 or 2 in their GCSEs.
Young people aged 14-18 years are supported so that that they can become more motivated to learn and to progress to further education or employment.
The project is based on the following elements to achieve results:
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Accreditation programmes
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Wider key skills programme
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Extended school activities
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Aspiration raising events
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Work related learning.
For more information about the project please visit the Stoke City Football Club Community Programme's website.
