A key role identified when the club created the Director of Hockey role was to develop a School Outreach Programme. The aim was to make an impact in our local community, particularly in the state sector and to attract young people to hockey. Further, increasing exposure to the sport of hockey in the local area may encourage more young people to take up the sport and possibly attend our holiday camps and even help to grow our junior membership moving forward.
Neil Murphy and the DOH worked together to secure funding from the London Hockey Futures Programme which, aligned with support from the SSLT (Southgate Sports and Leisure Trust) ensured we would be able to maximise our offer to schools. If schools were unable to finance our visits they were not precluded from involvement as we would be able to offer coaching free of charge.
Year 1
Developing this strategy from a standing start, we made significant progress in year one. The DOH role covered the vast majority of the coaching requirements with support from a few of our junior coaches. Akshay Palaniappan, Lucy Cope, Harry Haynes, Sofia Martin, Olivia Richardson and Georgie Castle all coached in schools at various points during 2023 and the first half of 2024. We worked with 12 state schools and 3 independent schools during the academic year, working in schools in the Barnet, Enfield and Haringey Boroughs as well as schools in Hertfordshire. We coached in various environments, providing breakfast & after school clubs, lessons, Sports Week visits, festivals, masterclasses and hosting primary schools in an event on the water pitch at Southgate.
The knock on effect over the course of the year was to see a number of children attending our holiday camps and joining the club, with some bringing siblings to the club too.
Year 2
This academic year we built on the success of the first year of the School Outreach Programme. In our first two years, we have worked with 29 state schools and 7 independent schools in a variety of contexts including clubs, school day sessions, masterclasses, festivals and regular contracted coaching.
In Year 2 we have worked with 17 state schools for the first time and all 4 independent schools were new collaborations. We introduced hockey to more than 270 children when we attended the North London LYG Inspire Festival, the Enfield Girls’ Sports Festival and hosted Enfield and Barnet primary schools for a hockey festival. Our School Outreach Programme for Year 2 came to a close with our final session at Rhodes Avenue Primary School for the term.
The success of the Outreach Programme has seen 12 club coaches and 2 young coaches contribute to the delivery of the programme. We have worked with more than 1000 children in the community to encourage healthy, active lifestyles and promote the sport of hockey.
Please get in touch if your school would like to work with Southgate HC in Year 3!
