The National Youth Agency - Sports Volunteering North West Young People's programme

Sports Volunteering North West Young People's programme

BASIC INFORMATION

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Case study date: September 2007

Areas covered by project: Cheshire, Cumbria, Greater Manchester, Lancashire, and Merseyside.

Date started: 2002

Type of organisation: Independent regional body

Brief description:

Sports Volunteering North West (SVNW), an independent regional body representing volunteers and the voluntary sector in sport and physical activity in the North West established the Young People’s Programme in 2002. Using sport as a vehicle to develop leadership skills in young people, the programme combines and coordinates the Millennium Volunteers and Step into Sport volunteer programmes. It provides signposting and supported pathways into volunteering placements and potential employment in sport for young people across the region.

Collaboration:

Sports Volunteering North West works with v, Sport England and the Youth Sport Trust (the coordinators of the Step into Sport programme), colleges of higher and further education, and the five county sport partnerships (responsible for coordinating the delivery of sport in their area) of Cheshire, Cumbria, Greater Manchester, Lancashire, and Merseyside.

Funding:

The programme is funded by Sport England, the Youth Sport Trust, Millennium Volunteers and Goldstar, the Cabinet Office initiative which promotes good practice for volunteers from socially excluded groups.

Staffing:

The programme is coordinated by the SVNW Regional Development Manager and Volunteer Managers in each of the five county sports partnerships, plus up to 250 volunteer coordinators and mentors across the region.

NATURE OF PROVISION

Which groups of young people does the project work with?

Each year, around 800 young volunteers from the age of 16 to 24 are recruited onto the programme. Between April 2006 and March 2007, nearly half of volunteers were female (45%), seven per cent were young people from black and minority ethnic communities, and six per cent were young people with a disability.

How was the need for the project identified?

The need for a Millennium Volunteers (MV) sports project in the North West was established in 2002 as part of the legacy of the Manchester Commonwealth Games. In 2003, the Youth Sport Trust started the Step into Sport youth volunteering programme which sits alongside the MV in Sport programme, creating the SVNW Young People’s Programme.

How do young people become involved? What, if any, commitment do you ask for?

Most young people who become involved in the Step into Sport programme are referred from their school. Step into Sport is part of the government’s national School Sport strategy, providing pathways for young people to move on from taking part in school sports to becoming involved in clubs, sports leadership and volunteering. Young people who are not currently in education are recruited through community routes, such as local sports clubs, volunteer centres or county sport partnership networks, and join the programme on the MV side.

What are the main approaches used and activities offered?

The main aim of the Young People’s Programme is for young people to acquire the confidence, knowledge and skills to encourage them to begin a long term involvement in sports volunteering and leadership. The programme also allows them to gain practical job related experience.

Young people referred through Step into Sport follow a five point pathway. They begin at school with a programme of sport education; go onto sports leadership awards and taster volunteer sessions such as planning and running a sports festival for primary age children; and then progress to being involved in a programme of community volunteering. This programme will typically take the form of a placement or volunteering opportunities provided through governing bodies of sport, clubs, local authority sports development departments and one off events. Placement providers are identified by school sport partnership development managers, local authority sport development officers or the county sport partnership staff. Young people are matched to their expressed interests as far as possible but roles can typically include:

sports coach - coaching and assisting qualified coaches in a club or community setting;
disability sport organiser – developing opportunities for disabled people to participate and compete;
database and internet designer – working with clubs to improve communications using IT; and
sports physiotherapy – helping to promote the health and well-being of injured sports participants.

Other tasks include general administration and finance, fundraising, and promoting activities in the media. Young people receive supervision and support through volunteer coordinators and mentors based at their placement. The initial placement is usually a year, but can finish early if it leads to paid employment or the young person leaves for further study. MV volunteers combine community volunteering opportunities with support and supervision.

SVNW follows clearly defined policies and procedures in placing young volunteers. Each provider receives a pack outlining the policies and procedures that must be in place before a placement begins. The county sport partnership also provides help and ongoing support to the placement providers to ensure that the opportunities on offer are appropriate and of high quality. Most of the sports clubs that young people are placed with have achieved Clubmark, a Sport England accreditation scheme for clubs with junior sections.

How are young people involved in shaping the programme?

Each of the five county sport partnerships involves young people in developing ideas for the kinds of volunteering opportunities they want through formal forum style groups or informal drop-in discussion sessions.

A young person who has been involved with the Young People’s Programme is also a member of the SVNW board.

How does the project respond to the needs of different young people, particularly the most marginalised?

One of the key objectives of the programme is to ensure the demographic profile of the young people on the programme matches the profile of the local community. The project has set up referral links with community based organisations such as Connexions, crime reduction partnerships and Nacro to encourage young people from socially excluded backgrounds into volunteering. This has increased the numbers of volunteers involved who are not in education, training or employment and those at risk of crime.

OUTCOMES OF WORK

Does the project contribute to the five Every Child Matters outcomes for young people?

Young people make a positive contribution to their local communities through their volunteering and become more ready for employment.

What skills do young people gain through their involvement in the project?

Young people acquire practical employment based skills from their volunteering, which help them secure interviews and jobs. They also gain in confidence and develop team working and leadership skills.

How are young people's progress and achievements measured and recorded?

Young people have access to a wide range of qualifications and certificates including sports specific coaching badges and (at present) MV accredited certificates. Many also study for qualifications that relate to their specific volunteering role, eg web design, photography etc. Individual young volunteers have also won awards, including national and regional Sport England and MV awards, Whitbread Young Achiever and Unsung heroes awards.

What has changed for other young people, organisations or the wider community as a result of the project?

Young people who are members of local sports clubs benefit from being coached or supported by a peer. Local sports clubs benefit from young people being involved as volunteers, often on a long-term basis.

MEASURING EFFECTIVENESS

How is the project evaluated and by whom?

Quantitative figures including the numbers of participants, hours spent volunteering, and certificates received are collated regionally and sent to v, Sport England, and the Youth Sport Trust. Qualitative information is collected in the form of case studies written by those working with the young people and the young people themselves. Case studies are also collected from the county sport partnerships on how they have developed links with placement providers or different sections of the community.

Quarterly management meetings are held with SVNW and the county sport partnerships to discuss what is and isn’t working in each local area, the way good practice is shared and how evaluation can be built into everyday practice. Feedback from young people on the programme is also included at these meetings.

What are the findings of any evaluations to date?

Of the 800 young people recruited as volunteers each year, half have completed 100 hours of volunteering and a third 200 hours of volunteering. Each gains on average just under two qualifications. Anecdotal evidence from young people suggests that many continue their involvement in volunteering on a long term basis.

The project has also been endorsed by Goldstar as a model of good practice.

What changes/developments have occurred as a result of evaluation?

Evaluation has highlighted the need to work with more hard to reach groups, with strategies currently being implemented to achieve this. Target setting has also been made more realistic.

To back up the anecdotal evidence, an online young person administered database is being developed which will track young people’s involvement in volunteering once they have left the programme.

What has worked well and why?

The quarterly management meetings have worked particularly well. The good practice is shared and developed, allowing the county sport partnerships to deliver as effectively as possible.

What has been difficult and why?

Engaging young people in the concept of ‘volunteering’ has been difficult at times. Sports volunteers see themselves as ‘coaches’, ‘umpires’, ‘treasurers’ etc and ‘volunteers’ as someone who works in a charity shop. A regular comment from young people consulted in the local sessions is that they want to be called something other than ‘volunteers’.

PARTNERSHIP AND STRATEGIC IMPACT

What other agencies do you work with?

The Young People’s Programme also works with the Nacro North West Volunteers Programme, helping to deliver sports coaching opportunities for young people at risk and with Goldstar, developing programmes for hard to reach young people.

What specific experience and expertise does your organisation bring to partnership work?

As an independent body, SVNW provides coordination and can bring interested parties together from across the region.

Has this partnership resulted in greater collaboration or increased understanding between partners?

Yes, the Young People’s Programme is an example of a regional programme being successfully delivered by the five county sport partnerships, rather than each operating in isolation.

Do you consider this project to be innovative?

The North West is the only region to deliver sports volunteering for young people in this way. Other regions are currently considering setting up comparable regional bodies based on the North West model.

How do you disseminate the learning from the project?

Learning is disseminated through a website and an e-zine which is circulated to over 700 sports stakeholders in the region and nationally.

Has the learning from this work influenced wider organisational/service strategies?

SVNW is seen as the lead authority on sports volunteering in the region, including having strategic leadership for the North West’s contribution to the volunteering legacy of the 2012 Olympic and Paralympic Games.

What plans do you have to sustain/develop this work?

SVNW’s recently published strategy identifies the following targets for the next six years: raising the profile of volunteering, attracting more young people into volunteering, and increasing the number of volunteers gaining qualifications and employment.

CONTACT:

Becky Underwood, Sports Volunteering North West, 5 Portland Square, Carlisle CA1 1PU Tel: 07717 586430

Internet: http://www.sportsvolunteeringnw.org/