In April 2008, Fulham FC Foundation launched its first sports volunteering project called ‘Community Champions’.
Over the past three years, the project has engaged 300 active volunteers between the ages of 14 and 25, with many volunteers dedicating a lot of their own time each year. The young person led project’s primary aim was to ‘use the power of football and sport to encourage young people to make a positive contribution to society’ and it has well and truly achieved this objective.
The project was funded by Premier League/ Professional Footballer’s Association, V’s Good Match funding and Sport England’s Community Investment Fund.
Our volunteers have, to date, participated in volunteer opportunities such as: sports coaching, social inclusion activities, disability projects, events, youth forum focus groups, outreach and sports administration.
There have been over 50,000 young people who have benefitting from the Community Champions volunteers via number of FFC Foundation programmes such as: social inclusion, disability and sports development sessions and external partner organisations. They all received personalised coaching and support from our Community Champions volunteers. Many volunteers undertook training and further development as part of their placement.
Community Champions has achieved many outcomes since April 2008:
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A total of 591 applicants during the project
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Engaged 245 male and 54 female active volunteers in the project’s three years.
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Of these active volunteers, many were retained from year 1 or year 2 of the project into the final year.
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415 volunteers were short term volunteers who completed 8 hours or less volunteering (343 male and 72 female).
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A total of 309 were part time volunteers, who completed over 8 hours
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There were 4 full time volunteers who all completed 30 hours per week, volunteering for a minimum of 13 weeks.
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There were 31 disabled short term and part time volunteers on the project.
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77 of volunteers have been NEET (not engaged in education, employment or training).
In April 2011, the project ended however we are pleased to announce that the Premier League/PFA community fund will contributed 60% funding for a further three years until July 2014. If you would like more information on this project or are keen to get involved as a partner or volunteer please get in touch.
For further information about our exciting range of educational, volunteering and employability programmes, please do not hesitate to contact us on 0870 442 5432 or email foundationinfo@fulhamfc.com|.