Colchester United Football in the Community are very pleased to have been awarded another three years funding to the value of £330,000 from the Premier League Charitable Foundation towards their delivery of Premier League Primary Stars and Premier League Kicks projects across Essex.
Colchester United Football in the Community’s Premier League Primary Stars Programme engaged with 4,165 Primary School children and 220 Primary School Teachers since 2016, delivering 1,794 sessions during this period!
Rick Goldsbrough Sport & Education Development Officer commented: "To be given the opportunity to reach out and work with children and school staff in the local community through Premier League Primary Stars for another three years is a real success.
"Our Reading, Maths, PSHE, SEN and PE projects allow us to use the power of football through Colchester United and The Premier League to engage with primary schools and offer additional learning and educational experiences to pupils and teachers."
Premier League Primary Stars PE Teacher Support Programme reported a positive impact on the teachers who took part in the 6-10week programme in 2018/19 with 75% of children whose class took part in the PE Teacher Support Programme stated an increase in their enjoyment.
Meanwhile, Premier League Kicks is a social inclusion project which provides sports sessions at no cost to the participants to negate any barriers there may be with cost or access to facilities.
The sessions are predominantly football based but work around the input from the groups attending. As well as sport we run enrichment sessions, qualifications and volunteering opportunities as well the chance to represent Colchester United against other Kicks schemes.
Tom Tayler, Community Development Manager, added: "We are delighted to once again be offering our Premier League Kicks sessions across North Essex for the next three years.
"Our current programme has had a fantastic impact on the communities we operate within and enabled us to forge new and strengthen partnerships currently in place with partner organisations.
Premier League Primary Stars programmes will be available again to schools throughout our community during 2019/20. If your Primary School is interested in working with our Football in the Community team please contact Sam.Beavis@colchesterunited.net for further details.
And keep your eyes open for where and when we'll be delivering our Premier League Kicks sessions from September onwards!