A Step In To Sport For Young People

Bath Rugby Foundation, Bath & North East Somerset Council?s Active Lifestyles and Health Improvement Team and the Youth Connect Team are working together to get more young people active by offering an intriguing programme of sports activities at two youth hub sites in Bath and North East Somerset.

The Door Step Sports clubs programmes at Southside Youth Hub in Bath and Peasedown St John Youth Hub offer a range of activities including canoeing, gym sessions, table tennis, rugby, basketball and dance. Door Step Sport is a recent and growing style of community engagement and sports delivery – there’s still a lot to learn and there are techniques to be tested. They bring a creative and flexible eye to new situations and challenges.

The sites are also being developed as centres for leadership for young people. 

Funding has been secured for 3 years from StreetGames with match funding for training coming courtesy of the Active Lifestyles Team and free facilities by the Youth Service. 

Sessions are led by staff from Bath Rugby Foundation and coach Becks Toan said, “The Doorstep Club is creating a culture of positivity at Southside by using the power of sport to get the young people active and engaged outside the Youth Hub instead of causing problems. We also have three young people who are now young leaders, assisting us with the sessions and sometimes even leading them. This has benefited these young people immensely on a personal level but it has also gained the respect of the other young people at Southside. Most importantly it’s encouraging the young people to get involved in the activities on offer”

B&NESC Cabinet Member for Early Years, Children and Youth, Councillor Dine Romero, said: “This programme has had a very positive effect on the young people that use the Southside Youth Hub. The programme is fun and the young people are excited by the different activities available.

“Both Southside and Peasedown have Youth Forums in place and these have been consulted to help design the initial programme and shape it going forward. The programme offers diversionary activities for young people including night youth cycling sessions and links are very strong with the local PSCOs and Youth Offending Teams.   Meanwhile the leadership programme allows young people to gain the skills and confidence they need to enter the world of work.”

15 year old Tom explained “At Southside I’ve got to try and play different sports on Wednesday evenings, which I’ve enjoyed a lot. One of the new sports I’ve enjoyed is Lacrosse, I’ve never played this sport before so it was something new and fun to play. In the end we had about 20 of my mates playing the sport as well, so it was really cool”

Southside Youth Hub has also benefited from extra funding through the Club 1 initiative that promotes solo sports and develops independence for young people to be active.

These Door Step Club sessions are open to anyone who’s between 15 – 25 years old, held on Mondays at Southside Youth Hub and Fridays at Peasedown St John Youth Hub. Anyone interested in getting involved should just pop along and introduce themselves.