Accentuate

Playground to Podium focused on six sports:

• Athletics
• Boccia
• Football
• Swimming
• Table tennis
• Wheelchair – Basketball

Thanks to Accentuate, it was possible to extend the Playground to Podium project in the South East in the following areas:

• Creation of an athlete bursary of up to £1,000 per person per year, designed to assist individuals with those expenses that are incurred in training and competition such as equipment, travel, accommodation, coaching and physiotherapy.
• A Club development fund of up to £5,000 per club per year, aiming to support clubs in the delivery of disability sport within the six Playground to Podium sports, assisting in such areas as providing equipment, facility improvements and upgrades, fees for venue or equipment hire, coaching or transport costs and costs associated with sporting competitions or events that contributes to athlete development & retention within the Playground to Podium context.A Workforce Development fund of up to £2,000 per person per year, used to provide training to the workforce directly supporting Playground to Podium in the South East. This included coaching and officials courses as well as disability awareness training.

In all 53 athlete bursaries were awarded to talented new athletes, supporting them to progress more quickly. For example, Rachel Emmanuel was identified by her school as part of P2P and invited to attend the 2010 Berkshire County Athlete Assessment Day, where she was assessed by England Athletics Disability Athletics Support Officer who identified her for follow up support. Rachel was then supported to join Reading AC where she has been a member since January 2011, working with coach Kevin Boyle.

‘The bursary from Accentuate is a big help to her in meeting her sporting needs. This will contribute to her expenses in her kit, memberships, sporting fees, travel and stay. This has been a big encouraging and motivating factor.’  Rachel has competed in a number of competitions and has recently been invited to attend the UKA Talent I.D squad.

In addition to bursaries to athletes, just under 200 volunteers/ coaches have accessed training with 23 awards supporting the development of new skills in working with disabled people. A further 21 awards were made to clubs to support them being more open and accessible.