Sports Devlopment Project Proposal

‘Try for yourself’ ‘Try for yourself’ is a new scheme offering children from the ages of 11-16 an opportunity to undertake sports that fall out of the bracket of the traditional sports, i.e football and rugby. This will be done by taking expensive sports equipment to local secondary schools in deprived areas in Leicester. Once at a secondary school provide the pupils with a chance to access the facilities a couple of nights a week for several weeks. As this project tackles secondary schools it falls under the policy of physical education and school sport policy. The reason this project is being devised is because children in deprived areas of Leicester are unlikely to have ever participated in sports such as American football, cycling or golf merely because of the price of the equipment. There is also the factor that schools in disadvantaged areas have ‘worse off facilities.’ There is a profoundly close relationship between poverty and attainment, such that ‘the more socially disadvantaged the community served by a school, the very much more likely it is that the school will appear to underachieve’ (Gibson and Asthana 1998). ‘Try for yourself’ ties in with the policy ‘Growing sport growing colleges’, one of their aims is to ‘Encourage new participants by providing opportunities for those who are not currently active or have been put off sport at school’ through giving opportunities to those who might not of been given the chance before. Leicestershire and Rutland strategy for physical activity 2009-2013 has ambitions for young people. One of their objectives is to ‘Increase the number of 5-19 year olds taking part in physical activity’. This project definitely helps to achieve this objective by encouraging children from deprived areas get involved into sport, hopefully leading them to a healthy lifestyle which tackles another objective of LRS of halting child obesity rates.

Aims for this project:    Give children the opportunity to undertake a variety of different sports, not just the traditional sports. Increase the overall participation levels of children in sport. Raise the awareness of the importance of undertaking physical activity, in turn helping to reduce obesity rates in children.

The last two aims tie in with Growing Sport Growing Colleges and Leicestershire and Rutland Strategy for sport aims and objectives. The target age group for the project is 11-16 year olds male or female, these 11-16 year olds are based in deprived areas in Leicestershire. Barriers to participation – One barrier stopping children participating is their own motivation. Several researchers investigated the differences in youth motives across sports, age, and gender and suggested that children and adolescents are subject to the environmental influences in their motivation to participate in certain physical activities (Brustad, 1988; White & Duda, 1994).Therefore one child not participating in sport or trying out a new sport might have a knock on effect as this could negatively influence their friends decision to participate. Physical activity levels in most affluent countries are low and many people do not meet the current recommendations, particularly for people with a low income (Ingrid, 2009). This shows that people who live in deprived areas do not get the same pleasures and opportunities as people who do not live in deprived areas. Projects Targets (KPIS) –     Visit over 10 secondary schools in the first 6 months. Give access to facilities a couple of nights a week. For each session ran having between 80-100 participants. Have participants enquiring into joining a club.

As ‘Try for yourself’ is based in deprived areas in the Leicestershire area the main organisation it will work with and have links with is ‘Leicestershire and Rutland Sport’. LRS run a coaching network which is beneficial towards this scheme. LRS provide high quality coaches for all schools in the Leicestershire area. School sport and physical activity networks (SSPAN) was set up in 2011. SSPAN ensure physical activity is offered to young people. They create school to school links, which will help to develop and raise the awareness of ‘Try for yourself’. Once implemented into one school and has been a success, SSPAN can promote it into other schools.

Furthermore they hope to create school to community links; this will tie in well with this scheme. As participants might enjoy the sports and want to take it further into a club and play competitively. Resources – All participants will be given all equipment needed. All sessions will take place at the school either at lunchtimes or after school after links have been set up with the schools. Coaches for the sessions will be provided from the LRS coaching network, which provide high quality services. Funding – This scheme will be mainly done through LRS, therefore most of the funding will be provided by Sport England. Sport England are in turn helped by funding through the National Lottery. Moreover as this scheme is aimed at children and for school sport, the government will help with the funding.

Gannt Chart

Analysis

Services

Preparing

Designing

26/01/2013

06/05/2013

14/08/2013

22/11/2013

02/03/2014

10/06/2014

Blue signals start date, red signals end date.

Solutions to barriers – The main barrier found to participation was motivation. To combat this; previous research in both sport and physical education has indicated that young people's goal orientations are predictive of their reasons for participating in these activities in the first place (Duda 1996). Therefore, if participants generate or are given goals to achieve then this will raise their motivation to play sport. High levels of self-esteem were associated with few perceived barriers to participation (Kincey 1993). Moreover, if the participants start to feel good playing sport and their self efficacy rises then their doubts whether to participate will decrease. Recommendations –

The target audience of this project could be expanded, as participation percentages are not just decreasing in 11-16 year olds but also across all ages. Instead of focusing on just the deprived Leicestershire areas, it could expand to a national framework as the project goes on. This is dependent on whether the project becomes a success in Leicester for funding to be provided. Moreover this project just aims to play sport recreationally, however as the participants play more and improve their abilities and skills they will want to play competitively. Therefore, local competitions could be set up monthly. Club and school links have to set up for the project to expand and offer the children the best opportunities. Conclusion – The key to success in this project is the backing of LRS; also it follows the same framework of SSPAN by going into local schools. However SSPAN hold the key to spreading the success as they hold the school to school links and school to club links which can help expand ‘Try for yourself’ locally. This project is definitely a physical education and school sport policy as it goes into schools promoting non traditional sports encouraging 11-16 year olds to get involved and participate in sport. This project is needed in the sport industry as it backs up a couple of aims in the LRS strategy for sport in the next couple of years; it also ties in with growing sport growing college’s aims and objectives.

Reference list

Brustad, R.J. (1988). ‘Affective outcomes in competitive youth sport: The influence on intrapersonal and socialization factors.’ Journal of Sport and Exercise Psychology, 10, 307-321.

Duda, L.J. (1996). ‘Maximizing Motivation in Sport and Physical Education Among Children and Adolescents: The Case for Greater Task Involvement.’ American
Academy of Kinesiology and Physical Education, 48, 290-302.

Gibson, A. and S. Asthana (1998), ‘School Performance, School Effectiveness and the 1997 White Paper’, Oxford Review of Education 24(2): 195-210 Ingrid, H.M. (2009). ‘Financial Barriers and Pricing Strategies Related to Participation in Sports Activities: The Perceptions of People of Low Income.’ Journal of Physical Activity and Health, 6, 716-721 Kincey, J. (1993) ‘ A study of self-esteem, motivation and perceived barriers to participation in sport and exercise among secondary school pupils’ Health Education Journal December, 52:241-245, White, S.A., & Duda, J.L. (1994). ‘The relationship of gender, level of sport involvement, and participation motivation to task and ego orientation.’ International Journal of Sport Psychology, 25, 4-18.

http://www.aoc.co.uk/en/policy-and-advice/sport/ http://www.lrsport.org/uploads/strategy-for-physical-activity-2009-13-12.pdf