SDS is delighted to be able to thank some great people in Volunteers Week, 1-7 June. Over this week SDS will be highlighting volunteers who contribute so much to making sport happen at a local, regional and national level. Today the spotlight is on the Scottish Disability Sport Young Persons Sport Panel.
The Young Persons Sport Panel (YPSP) was established in 2015 with a group of 12 young people aged between 14 and 25 who were nominated by the SDS member branches. The vision of the YPSP is to:
- Provide a voice for young people with a disability in Scotland
- Give young people with disabilities an opportunity to gain continuous personal development
- Be a key consultation group for SDS
- Share expertise and influence communication across sport and throughout Scotland
The panel has continued to develop over the last five years and has become an established group of volunteers who contribute massively to all areas within SDS. Over the last two years the YPSP have joined up with the Young Start Programme and both groups have been key consultation groups for SDS programmes, volunteered at numerous SDS events, grown in confidence, developed skills and gained a number of qualifications. SDS are lucky to have a great volunteer ambassador for the programme, Aileen Neilson, who provides great support and guidance to the young people.
During the Covid-19 pandemic the YPSP has grown from strength to strength helping to shape an online programme for other young people and have ideas and plans to take some of this back to their own branch areas. During this time the members of the YPSP have kept each other motivated, taken on responsibility to lead various elements of the online programme and created numerous wonderful videos to share with the wider SDS community with ideas of how to keep busy during lockdown.
In March 2020, SDS had planned to recruit a new Young Persons Sport Panel. However, this has been postponed until we are allowed to resume some activities. The current YPSP are a key group in the recruitment of the new panel and were involved in the shortlisting process and will be part of the interviews. Moving forward some of the YPSP have noted interest in staying involved in the panel in more of a leadership and mentor role and SDS are delighted that the experienced panel members would like to stay involved in some way and support the new panel to develop.
A huge thank you must go to all of the Young Persons Sport Panel for all of their contributions to SDS over the last five years. We are so grateful for everything you do for SDS and it is a pleasure to have worked with you all during that time. Thank you, Caitlyn Ross, Lewis McConnell, Colette Martin, Callum Sloan, Gemma Lumsdaine, Ross Foley, Hope Gordon, Mitchell Graham, Shelby Watson, Alan Gray, Stefan Hogan and Danielle Joyce.
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