Young Victims of Crime and Bullying Helped by Foundation’s Innovative Programme!

Working in collaboration with principal partner Cuadrilla Resources, the Foundation invited the boys and girls who are supported by Nest Lancashire to take part in the ‘Train Like A Pro’ programme.

Nest Lancashire was established to support young people who have been affected by crime or subjected to intimidation such as bullying, threats or harassment.

The young people spent a full week, participating alongside local grassroots teams, in the hugely successful all-inclusive project based at Mill Farm Stadium, completely free of charge.

‘Train Like A Pro’ specialises in delivering a unique opportunity, during which participants experience life as a professional sports person. They visit the state-of-the-art ground of AFC Fylde, meet players and enjoy a confidence-building week with new friends and teammates.

This summer has been the most successful on record for the newly extended and improved programme. The Foundation now offers a more diverse range of sports and activities suitable for girls and boys of all ability including dance workshops, boxing sessions, and overall fitness workouts. It enables participants to take part in new experiences, improve and develop skills, and make friends as well as memories.

Foundation Director Tom Hutton is incredibly proud of the success of the programme. He said: “Train Like A Pro is unique. It offers young people that may not normally get the chance, to visit a professional training environment and take part in great activities for a full week, free of charge. Seeing how much the participants enjoy and benefit from it is an incredibly rewarding feeling for myself, the coaches and everybody involved.”

Young victim support worker at Nest Lancashire, Corinne Bushell has seen the project develop positively throughout the summer and said “My role often involves supporting children through police investigations and court cases; we then support children and families with the outcome of these trials, which isn’t always positive.  Train like a Pro has been absolutely amazing because it has been fun, active and enjoyable for the children involved – a really good balance to the ongoing work that we do day-to-day. I have been involved with our partnership with AFC Fylde from the beginning and I have watched around 30 children have the absolute times of their lives this Summer.”

For more information and news stories please visit www.afcfyldefoundation.co.uk or keep up to date on twitter @afcfct.