How football could be included to support your University Sport Activation Fund application The new £15m University Sport Activation Fund was launched by Sport England at the BUCS ‘Strengthening your sporting offer’ event on the 26th November 2013. The fund is aimed at universities who wish to challenge themselves to continue to enhance their sporting offer to appeal to more HE students, and demonstrate the value that sport plays within wider university objectives. Sport England will be looking to support projects that can contribute towards the following key areas; 1. Flexible participation programmes 2. Intramural competition 3. Interuniversity social competition 4. Student clubs social section The fund will also look to support projects that trial new methods of getting students into sport, particularly those that do not currently play any sport. For full information of Sport England’s funding criteria and to download an application click here The University Sport Activation Fund opened on 6 January 2014 with applications closing on the 24th March 2014. BUCS Football Development appreciates that universities will be spending considerable time during this period formulating their applications. To make life a little easier we have put together this document with some useful information which may help if you are considering football as one of the sports you are looking to include as part of your application. Please note: The information provided in this document is simply a guide to help you with your thinking and including it in your application will not guarantee that Sport England will fund your university.
How football could be included to support your University Sport Activation Fund application BUCS/FA Football Development 6 point offer Note: The University Football Activator and Community Hub Club programmes are funded through the Whole Sport Plan and therefore can support with the delivery of your University Sport Activation Fund however you cannot apply for additional funding from Sport England for either of these two programmes.
(click on the programme for more information)
Useful Contacts Oliver Selfe National BUCS National Football Development Manager
[email protected] Prathiv Kholia BUCS Football Development Coordinator
[email protected] BUCS football website www.bucs.org.uk/football FA find your local County FA http://www.thefa.com/GetIntoFootball/CountyFA/CountyContacts
How football could be included to support your University Sport Activation Fund application This diagram demonstrates where the programmes in the ‘BUCS 6 point offer’ (orange) can support the areas that Sport England will fund (blue).
How football could be included to support your University Sport Activation Fund application The below table provides some examples of how the football programmes within the ‘BUCS 6 point offer’ can support universities to meet the funding criteria Fund criteria
Relevant FA Programme Team Twenty Three
Example
Impact
Partners
University apply for a Team Twenty Three equipment pack and launch new league through football activator
BUCS FA County FA
Student club social section
Mars Just Play
University apply for free Mars Just Play festival pack and host open entry tournament after football trails. Weekly Mars Just play centre delivered following tournament.
Applicants demonstrate wider partnership working Supports community activity
Football Partnership delivery model
University host partnership meeting to discuss delivery of the football programmes and identify impact on wider community football.
Community Hub Club
University link with FA Charter Standard Club and work in partnership to asset share i.e. facilities and workforce.
Increase in participants, creation of an intra mural community, volunteers supporting delivery of the new league. Student who do not make the trails still able to play (increase participation), student feel part of a club/society (student satisfaction). Wider community engagement, meets the needs of the community, opportunity for partnership funding. Opportunity for the university to signpost student volunteers coaches & referees into the club (student satisfaction and employability. Club able to develop new teams.
Engage new participants
University Football Club, County FA FA
County FA BUCS Charities Clubs Leagues Clubs FA BUCS County FA
How football could be included to support your University Sport Activation Fund application Delivery model ideas The below information is a suggestion of a potential delivery model that you could adopt to support the delivery of your football offer. Football Partnership is a group of people from a local community with a common interest in developing football opportunities for Children and Young People 16-25 (CYP) in their local communities. Many organisations need partners to be successful especially in meeting the sporting and employment needs of youth. In a time of diminishing resources and increased need, it’s clear no agency or organisation can go it alone. Collaborative relationships that work really well are those that focus on what people actually DO together, and not just on the structure they create. We want your CYP football partnerships to be a verb not a noun! Who could make up the football partnerships? The list below provides an example of the type of organisations that could be represented.
Impact of CYP Partnerships Through partners having the right conversations and asset sharing expertise, facilities and resources we hope to create sustainable and appropriate opportunities for children and young people 16-25 to take part and stay involved in football activities.
How football could be included to support your University Sport Activation Fund application Case Study The University of Portsmouth in partnership with BUCS and the Hampshire FA Through effective partnership working and utilising the ‘HE Football offer’. The University of Portsmouth have been able to create a robust football pathway for their students, which has seen a significant impact upon football participants, student satisfaction and employability. The partnership started by agreeing regular meetings between the County FA and university and agreeing key development priorities. The university successfully applied to become a referee hub and the County FA supported by creating a tailored referee development pathway for their students. A University Football Activator was then recruited as part of the BUCS Football Activator pilot programme and this student was tasked with establishing a new small sided intra mural league at the university which was launched early 2013 and now has over 50 team and 350 participants. The County FA has also been able to offer mentoring support to the student Football Activator and has recently agreed with the Director of Sport at the university to base a Football Development Officer from the Hampshire FA at the university two days a week. In addition The University of Portsmouth have become a BUCS ‘Team Twenty Three’ deliverer and have recently been awarded £2,500 via the FA Community Hub Club fund to develop wider community engagement through the Universities ‘Up For Sport’ project. We have developed excellent working partnerships with BUCS, The FA and County FA over the past 18 months enhancing our student offer and accessing additional funding which has resulted in significant growth in participation and the quality of our programmes”. Sarah Taylor Sports Development Manager University of Portsmouth
Student volunteers from The University of Portsmouth help deliver the Intra Mural Football
