A sporting chance for school pupils – University of Reading
25 February 2005
Around 100 local secondary school pupils, aged 14 to 16, gathered at the Bulmershe Campus at the University of Reading on Thursday 24 February 2005 to participate in an action-based conference. Focusing on leadership and volunteering, the day was run and led by a team of 21 undergraduate volunteer students from the University's BA Leadership in Sports degree. The event was run in partnership with the University's 'Active in Reading' student volunteering programme, The Physical Education and Sports Department of the University and The British Youth Sports Trust. The conference was one of 24 simultaneous events replicated at higher education institutions across the UK. The event builds on the Youth Sport Trust's TOP Link initiative, which fosters leadership skills in young people by encouraging secondary age students to organise and stage sports days or dance festivals for primary or special school children in their local area. The students led workshops providing practical advice and guidance on how to run a successful TOP Link festival. This included topics such as managing the festival team, the media and the event, health and safety and the importance of nutrition in sport. In the afternoon, the school pupils themselves had the opportunity to lead practical activities and fun games based on the Youth Sport Trust TOP programmes. All the activities provided the school pupils with additional ideas for their festivals and enabled them to run safe and enjoyable sports events in their local school communities. Running alongside the conference was a professional development day for teachers. The day included opportunities to extend leadership experiences for young people and explore delivering citizenship through physical education and sport. TOP Link is part of the Department for Culture, Media and Sport (DCMS) Step into Sport leadership and volunteering project which has been designed to establish a simple framework of co-ordinated opportunities at a local level, to enable young people and adults to become involved in leadership and volunteering through sport. End For media enquiries only, please contact Craig Hillsley, the University press officer, on (tel) 0118 378 7388 or (email) c.hillsley@rdg.ac.uk