Community Kicks teaching young people about Respect in Newry

The Respect Project, which is based at the St John Bosco Youth Centre in Newry, uses sport to engage young people and help create safer, stronger and more respectful communities throughout the Newry and Mourne area.

Working with Radius Housing, the Respect Project ran the Community Kicks programme for 10-14 year olds from 15 housing developments across the city. Community Kicks held 30 outreach training sessions between June and September, which saw 1000 young people joining in. The project used football as a way of helping the young people to develop new social and leadership skills, and build respect for their neighbourhood and wider community.

Community Kicks is supported by the Department for Communities and the Northern Ireland Housing Executive’s ‘Housing for All’ Shared Housing Programme. The Programme has its origins in the NI Executive Together: Building a United Community Strategy which reflects the Executive’s commitment to improving community relations and continuing the journey towards a more united and shared society. £5,431,082 has been invested in both the Radius Rockmount and Ardmore shared housing developments and associated five-year Good Relations Plans.

The work of the Respect Project has been widely acknowledged as a model of good practice in using sport as a way of addressing social issues in the Community. The project received a highly commended award for its work at the Northern Ireland Department of Justice Community awards.

Speaking about the programme, Blanaid Bruce, Communities Officer, Radius Housing, said “The Respect project and Community Kicks has been incredibly successful in bringing together young people to build new friendships and teach them valuable lessons in teamwork and positive community relations. The feedback we received from children and parents has been so enthusiast about the benefits of the programme.

“Radius Housing is delighted to work with the Respect Project to deliver Community Kicks. Bringing together all these young people in such a fun way has a really important role in supporting the whole Newry community to flourish.”

Martin Connel from RESPECT added “Our goal is to use football to bring young people together, and use that as a way of teaching them about respect and understanding, and the importance of community. This project keeps growing because of how effective it is and the young people are really engaged and enthusiastic about it. We are grateful to Radius Housing for the support they have given to RESPECT.”

The positive impact Community Kicks had has been noted by parents of participants:

“My child would suffer from social anxiety and loved the fact that he took part in an event with such big numbers.”

“This programme has been brilliant. My son has been so shy and quiet and always withdraws over the summer months. It has been amazing to see him so keen and eager to go along each week and get stuck in and have fun with his peers.”

“Thank you for making my child feel so welcome in the programme. He is hard to get involved in things like this and took a bit of persuading to go to the first session as he didn’t know many who were going. So glad we encouraged him to go as he loved it that much he went to it in other areas.”

Radius Housing Association currently has 11 shared housing developments across Northern Ireland.

The Rockmount and Ardmore Good Relations Plan includes ‘Bridging’ events which are delivered to the wider community to encourage a range of good relations outcomes which include Health and Wellbeing, and Education & Training.