Support from youth services has never been more needed than in the last 18 months, but Covid restrictions and dwindling resources have made it tough to meet demand. Money from Sport England’s Tackling Inequalities Fund (TIF) has therefore been a lifeline for many of Levelling the Playing Field’s local delivery partners.
The funding was secured by the Alliance of Sport in Criminal Justice and distributed to partners to adapt and maintain support when young people from ethnically diverse communities needed it most through the pandemic.
Here, we take a look at how the TIF was used by some of our delivery partners in England and the impact it’s had on participants.
Positive Youth Foundation, Coventry
Positive Youth Foundation (PYF) found their TIF crucial in continuing their connection with young people, many of whom struggled with mental health, isolation and inactivity during the lockdown periods.
Although lockdowns forced PYF to halt their two weekly face-to-face LtPF sport sessions, they used the funding to put on interactive games, Zoom calls with special guests (such as Leicester City FC’s groundsman), home support visits and T-shirts. “Numbers did decrease when delivery went online, but it enabled us to keep those relationships with our participants and build trust with young people, siblings and parents,” says PYF Project Coordinator Nikki Miles.
It was a hugely gratifying moment for staff when face-to-face sports sessions were able to resume at outside venues over Easter (using TIF) once restrictions had been relaxed.
“Sending that text message to parents at Easter [to announce the resumption of sports sessions] was a lovely and emotional moment for us,” says Nikki. “Those 8-13-year-olds have really struggled while not being at school. Being in such a deprived area, some of them didn’t have the resources that the rest of us take for granted.”
So many young people attended they had to split into morning after afternoon sessions. “That was a highlight for me, seeing everyone flooding back in,” says Nikki. “We did football, basketball, boxing, dodgeball, team-building, tennis... you name it, with 20-40 young people. We also made sure they were fed every day.
“We found that so many of them had been isolated. They’d become so comfortable playing at home on their Xbox or Playstation, so it was a case of making them feel safe to come out and join in, because it was a frightening time for everybody.
“It’s been a very difficult year, but thanks to Levelling the Playing Field, those young people have had an opportunity to build relationships within sport and physical activity, have difficult conversations, mentoring, helping them regulate their emotions and enjoy the benefits of a safe environment.”
Reach Up Youth, Burngreave, Sheffield
Reach Up Youth run two Levelling the Playing Field sessions; Big Brother Burngreave (for boys) and Sisterhood (for girls). The TIF enabled them to continue engaging both groups through lockdown, including funding the delivery of some important training.
Founder Safiya Saeed used TIF to deliver mental health training, Covid-19 risk assessments and educate young people with English as a second language about how the pandemic and lockdown made them vulnerable to crime and exploitation. Safiya also bought supplies for ‘Food for Mood’ cookery classes.
Additionally, the TIF was used to take participants to a boxing gym across the city and hire a specialist tutor. “It really helped us ‘pop the lid’ on a lot of young people’s frustration that had built up due to Covid-19,” said Safiya.
Aptitude, Coventry
Whilst sports sessions were postponed due to Covid-19 restrictions, Aptitude redirected funding towards one-to-one mentoring with young people. Staff also distributed health and activity packs to participants’ homes and came up with sports activity challenge videos for them. When permitted, staff put on one-to-one sports sessions in a community venue or at Aptitude’s family hub.
“The lockdown rules were very restricting for us and the young people but it did give us an opportunity to try new things,” says Aptitude founder Tara Foster. “TIF allowed us to put on activities that kept the momentum going and gave us opportunities to engage young people differently. We really improved our social media platforms to communicate in a different way.”
Sport sessions were held whenever restrictions allowed and returned in earnest on April 1. Tara said: “Thanks to the TIF grant we were able to get back out the door straight away and our Levelling the Playing Field group did 3v3 football sessions at full speed to recover some fitness.”
Aptitude did sport-based mentoring sessions with targeted referrals from health, social care or schools. “We were receiving referrals with a higher level of need because of the school closures, particularly mental health issues,” says Tara. “At one point we had 10 with safeguarding concerns (up five-fold year-on-year) and one of our young people was a victim of an attempt to groom him on an online computer game into selling drugs.”
Sport 4 Life, Birmingham
Sport 4 Life’s Levelling the Playing Field session is well attended, with an average of 20 participants (mostly young males) playing football every Friday between 5-7pm. They have held a joint tournament with a group from Aston Villa’s Premier League Kicks programme as well as hosting guests such as Army recruitment officers, PCSOs and a mentoring team. The philosophy is that it’s ‘more than sport’, with youngsters signposted towards qualifications including Sports Leaders and employability support.
The football sessions are the ‘hook’ at the core of these positive knock-on effects, so TIF has come in especially useful to keep those sessions going whenever restrictions allowed. A nearby school stopped hiring out its 3G pitch at ‘community rates’ during the pandemic, so the TIF funding went towards hiring an alternative venue at Powerleague or Goals.
“Sadly, our rental fees went through the roof so TIF came along at a good time,” said Sport 4 Life Training Project Manager, Craig Corrigan. “We pride ourselves on providing a safe space to play sport and being a zone where there are no hostilities.
“What we really enjoy about the Levelling the Playing Field programme is that it’s not a short-term fix. We’re not here to grab some participation data and disappear after eight weeks. They know we’ll be at Powerleague every week, we’re consistent, reliable and our mentors and qualifications tutors are a phone call away. That enables our coaches to build really solid relationships with young people. It has been really impactful.”
NPV Football Development, Wolverhampton
Similarly, NPV used the TIF to hire new facilities after the school pitch they previously used was shut down during the pandemic. The move actually led to an explosion in participant numbers once restrictions were lifted in early April.
“It’s blown up completely!” says founder Joe Jackson. “The school grounds were hidden from view, but since we’ve re-started at a local park right on the main road, the amount of people driving past who have stopped and asked to join up has been unbelievable.”
NPV started with around 40 children (aged 4-14) in April but now has 140 (with 177 signed up overall). Joe is now advertising for new coaches to cope with demand.
Urban Yogis, London
Urban Yogis made extensive use of their TIF with a new, multi-faceted approach to engaging participants despite the restrictions.
During lockdown they compiled an extensive online timetable with five yoga classes a week (delivered via pre-recorded video and live on Instagram Live to its 1800+ followers). Mentoring support was offered to those needing extra help through phone calls and virtual meetings. The money was also used to support a volunteer in qualifying as a yoga teacher.
Face-to-face yoga classes were offered in three schools in Croydon, when permitted, which were extremely positive.
Sporting Elite, Birmingham
Sporting Elite’s Friday night Levelling the Playing Field football session is attended regularly by 70-80 young people in the area. TIF went towards pitch hire, coaches’ fees and prizes which have allowed the sessions to become more structured and provided increased incentive for young people to attend.
Since it resumed in April, the session has been organised into 12 teams, with a ‘Premier League’ and ‘Championship’ of six teams each and promotion and relegation between them. Each member of the title-winning teams gets a football shirt of their choice or a football. Many attendees have progressed into Sporting Elite’s Saturday 11-a-side teams in the local leagues. Some have started volunteering as referees and have been given summer contracts doing community work.
Informal mentoring takes place off the pitches with young people. Staff prompt conversations when they arrive or while playing little two-touch games in-between matches.
Director Seb Hamilton says: “We greet them at the door very openly. It's as simple as, ‘How’s your week been?’ If something doesn’t seem quite right with them, we pull them aside and ask, ‘What’s going on?’ The informal mentoring happens quite naturally. Our approach just works. It can be vital for our young people.”
TSA Projects, Birmingham
TSA Projects run an open-access sports and youth club for at-risk young people in the Nechells area of Birmingham. TIF enabled its coaches and mentors to maintain provision during lockdown – a difficult period which also saw two young people they worked with stabbed to death.
“My work is raw. I often feel like I’m in the trenches,” said TSA Projects founder Tanayah Sam. His club is working at its maximum capacity of 50 participants and many have complex issues and severely deprived backgrounds.
“Thank God that the Alliance of Sport have been able to get hold of this funding because it has helped so many smaller organisations like ours,” he said. “Two young people have died, others have gone to prison, so we’ve been trying to pick up the pieces with family and friends as well as engage and support many others with positive activity.”
TSA Projects share a facility and staff with another local charity, Free At Last. Their building has a 14.5m climbing wall, pool table, tables tennis, boxing bags, a hall for football and basketball, scooters, mountain bikes, a recording studio, live instruments, DJ booth, a green screen to make videos, PlayStations and a computer room with graphic design software. They have three trained mentors to work with young people one-to-one.
“The TIF funding was the first opportunity for TSA Projects to take the lead in delivery of the sport provision,” said Tanayah. “It funded instructors for the climbing walls, a female table tennis coach from Sport 4 Life and continued mentoring support. It was the TIF that enabled us to do that in such a difficult period.
“The rules during lockdown allowed us to work with vulnerable young people with session time reduced to 40 minutes. Some of those kids are really vulnerable so we had to carry on behind closed doors. We had to safeguard these young people, keep them engaged in something positive and away from the streets. It’s overwhelming sometimes, but giving them opportunities to engage in positive activity is absolutely vital.”