Club’s Aspire programme a success in Stevenage

Stevenage FC has been busy off the pitch in recent months with the establishment of the club’s Aspire programme which sees players becoming involved with the local community.

Launched in September Aspire is already attracting interest from numerous other football clubs and social action groups all over the country. The project seeks to inspire aspiration within children and will be delivered to more than 14,000 schoolchildren aged eight-16 over the course of the current academic year.

In total 48 local schools will each receive 10 hours of interactive workshops focused around the programme’s six key topic areas: teamwork, goal setting, motivation, aspiration, leadership and role models.

The workshops contain videos of the club’s first team players demonstrating how the six key areas impact on their day to day lives as professional footballers and how the key messages of each workshop can be applied to everyday life in school, sport and society.

The 480 workshops are also being supported by monthly visits to each of the 48 participating schools by every member of the Stevenage first team squad who are helping to reinforce the key messages by delivering motivational based tasks to the pupils, with the winner of each task being given the opportunity to receive their prizes on the pitch at forthcoming Stevenage home matches.

The club’s head of community, Alex Tunbridge, said: “The groundbreaking project has already received an exceptional response from the schools that are currently participating and the feedback from both pupils and parents has been extremely positive. The project is unique in the way it brings the whole club together to deliver a key message, in order to make a significant difference to the lives of young people within our community.

“A big thank you must go to the first team management and players who have offered their time to the project and to making a difference within the community we all work and live in.”

For more information about the Aspire programme and to keep up to date with all the players’ involvement with the project see the club’s match day programme and visit the club’s website over the remainder of the season.