Project: School holiday sports
Funding: £5,000 from Chelmer Housing Partnership and use of a council sports facility
Aim: To give young people meaningful activities outside of school Crime-reduction charity Nacro is working with young people at risk of offending in Essex to get them interested in sports.
As part of the project in Chelmer, Nacro has teamed up with Chelmer Housing Partnership (CHP) to offer young people activities in the school holidays. Young people aged from 11 to 19 are invited to go to the council-run sports centre, where the project is based, to get involved in sports such as football and trampolining, but also more unconventional activities, such as Gladiators-style games and a bouncy castle.
David Streetley, Nacro's community sports co-ordinator, says the initiative gives young people the chance to be more active but to also learn respect. "We work with the police and I believe they don't get children hanging around doing antisocial things in the holidays because they are doing something with us," he says. "We use the sports centre, and the children we work with aren't the children that would usually use that facility. Because we offer them free use of our activities it's good for them and they respect the equipment a lot more because they are allowed in there."
Lynne Foster, CHP's operations director, says: "CHP is committed to resident involvement, and we're delighted that the central residents' forum saw fit to award a fantastic organisation like Nacro the funds to allow it to continue to provide facilities and fun activities for the children and young people of Essex."
Streetley hopes the young people who use the scheme will develop a love of sports. Nacro has worked in Chelmer for the past six years.
