Friday 23rd March – Forrester / St Augustine’s RC High School Campus, Edinburgh
The seventh annual Para Sport Festival took place at Forrester / St Augustine’s Community Sports Hub, Edinburgh on Friday 23rd March, attracting 81 school aged pupils with a physical or sensory impairment from across the East of Scotland to register for the event. The festival, which is supported by the Celtic Foundation, aims to provide a platform for young people from the mainstream education environment an opportunity to access sports delivered by experienced coaches while also raising awareness in Para Sport. This year’s event saw a slight change in format, inviting young people to a session that involved sports that were appropriate to their impairment.
The number of young people attending the event has grown year on year since its inception in 2012 and demonstrates a strong picture of partnership working between Scottish Disability Sport and Active Schools Edinburgh with significant input from key organisations Lothian Disability Sport and Edinburgh Leisure. Active Schools Coordinators from Edinburgh provide a pivotal presence on the day, facilitating the event and leading the groups of young people throughout while making them feel welcome and supported for the day. There was also significant support from Edinburgh College students at this year’s event, another partnership that has been formed over time to develop the event and provide essential experience for individuals in relation to working with people with a disability.
Jill Coleman, who has the responsibility for Disability and Inclusion within Active Schools Edinburgh while also taking a lead role on the festival commented, ‘The annual Para Sports Festival is an event looked forward to by the entire Active Schools Edinburgh team and this year was no different, the team worked hard in collaboration with schools to identify potential participants and their hard work paid off and was evidenced by the high number of Edinburgh attendees. The event was full of inspiring young people, many having their eyes opened to new sporting opportunities they hadn’t previously had experience of.  We have already received really positive feedback from attendees and parents regarding the new format of splitting the day into disability specific opportunities and this being more manageable in terms of length of event particularly for younger participants’.
The day is also supported by some Scottish Governing Bodies and delivered by local inclusive clubs from the region, providing a direct link for any young people who are keen to make that transition into more regular sporting opportunities. The sports delivered on the day were Athletics, Boccia, Goalball, Judo, Swimming, Tennis, Triathlon and Wheelchair Basketball. Additionally, parents are encouraged to attend and stay for the duration of the event and providing an insight to disability sport and the opportunities that are available to their sons / daughters in local and surrounding areas.
The event was also supplemented by an Athlete ‘Question & Answer’ session, welcoming current sporting stars along to provide an insight to their journey so far as an athlete. Local athletes Hope Gordon (Swimming) and Luke Pearce (Wheelchair Basketball) supported sessions in their respective sports during the morning of the event before answering a host of questions for the young participants in the Q&A session. Paralympic silver medallist Alison Patrick was kind enough to show off her medal from Rio before answering questions about her journey as visually impaired triathlete. This afternoon was also supported by visually impaired goalball player and member of the GB National team Matthew Loftus.
Neal Herbert, Scottish Disability Sport Regional Manager (East) highlighted,
‘The numbers attending on the day continue to highlight the popularity and the need for the event in the region. Around half of the young people were new to the event and this is down to the hard work that partners do before the day in terms of identifying eligible participants from their local area. Active Schools are key to this and continue to work well in collaboration with Scottish Disability Sport to make the festival a success and aim to encourage all participants into regular sporting opportunities post event.
Additionally, the collaborative working between many governing bodies of sport and local inclusive clubs provide an ideal opportunity for many young people to try particular sports for the first time and therefore hopefully encouraging them into more regular opportunities.’
For further information, please get in touch with Neal Herbert, Scottish Disability Sport Regional Manager (East) on 0131 625 4414 or neal.herbert@scottishdisabilitysport.co.uk.
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