JUNE NEWSLETTER
Gordon MacLelland
CEO at Working with Parents in Sport (WWPIS) - 'Supporting organisations, coaches, parents and children to work effectively together to help young people fulfil their potential both in and out of their sport.'
Dear Subscriber,
What a month we have had here at WWPIS visiting every country in the UK and Ireland to deliver workshops. We have definitely seen a greater taste for face to face offerings in recent months.
There has been a lot of work going on behind the scenes and during the course of the next month you will see some changes to the Members Platform. We will be removing the ‘High Performance’ section and replacing it with a ‘Holistic Development’ section with a real focus on providing high quality content on a regular basis.
We have an incredible range of contributors lined up to support and they have been tasked with providing parents with the most useful and practical resources possible.
Highlights of the month included an evening at South Essex Gymnastics Club where we were followed by a film crew from British Gymnastics. We carried out interviews with parents, coaches and athletes and can’t wait to see the finished product.
This month also saw the national awareness campaign ‘Clean Sport Week’ run across the UK by UKAD. It was great to support the week and have them contribute a blog around anti-doping for our viewers.
The Parents in Sport podcast this month saw us joined by former England Cricketer Lydia Greenway to discuss growing female sport and how we can best support and inspire the young females in our lives.
In the fourth episode of the ‘Meet the Parents’ series we were joined by sports parent Wendy Purdie who is the mother of international gymnast Shannon Archer who shared her? personal experiences of supporting Shannon on her journey to date.
You can find out more about all of these items in this month’s newsletter.
SPORT IRELAND PROJECT
Working with Parents in Sport have been working on a project with Sport Ireland over the last couple of years to create workshops for clubs, coaches and parents of younger children to help establish positive environments and relationships on young people's first foray into sport.
We are now in the piloting phase after the creation of the workshops and accompanying resources. This month saw us visit County Mayo to deliver the sessions as well as virtually deliver to partners in County Clare.
Later in the year we will be visiting the Emerald Isle to train Sport Ireland Tutors who will then be able to deliver the sessions on a regular basis throughout the country.
This has been a huge project and one that we are extremely excited to be a part of.
SOUTH ESSEX AND MEAPA GYMNASTICS CLUB VISITS
We had a great couple of days in Essex visiting two of our most valued partners. Our evening at South Essex saw us deliver two sessions for parents on ‘Managing Disappointment and Avoiding Devastation’ with British Gymnastics filming the event and interviewing parents, coaches and gymnasts.?
It was great to catch up with Olympian Courtney Tulloch with the messages coming back loud and clear that we all need to be working in partnership in the best interests of our young people.
At Meapa Gymnastics Club we delivered a session for parents but also for gymnasts. We had a wonderful time speaking with the girls about their sport, the best bits, the challenges and everything in between whilst trying to help them make sense of their sporting journey.
We also spent time stressing the importance of building a positive support network and helping them to communicate well to those involved around their sport.
IAPS WORK AND RADNOR HOUSE VISIT
Our work in schools is now growing considerably and it is a privilege to visit so many wonderful establishments.
We have had increasing numbers of schools reaching out to us with many booking sessions for September and October already to help get their sporting programmes off to a flying start.
This month saw us deliver a virtual session to Directors of Sport on ‘Building a Positive Parent Culture’ within school sporting programmes for IAPS and we also visited Radnor House in Twickenham to deliver sessions to staff and put plans in place to launch an annual programme working together from September.
PARENTS IN SPORT PODCAST - LYDIA GREENWAY
In this episode former international cricketer, coach and broadcaster Lydia Greenway joins Gordon MacLelland to discuss growing female sport and how we can best support and inspire the young females in our lives.
During the conversation they discuss amongst other things:
To listen to the episode click here.
MARKETING VIDEO AND BROCHURE
We have recently added some new products and services to both our Company Brochure and National Governing Body Brochure.
Be sure to check out our video and brochure highlighting the many services that we offer.? We have worked really hard to ensure that there is so much flexibility in the product that we can really customise it for every individual need whether you are a sporting organisation, coach or parent.
A large part of the success of WWPIS has been to relay information specific to the environments and contexts that people find themselves in and that is something that we will continue to work hard to achieve through as many different mediums as possible.
To watch the video and read the interactive brochure please click here.
Please do not hesitate to get in touch if you would like us to design something specifically for you and your requirements.
SPEAKING ENGAGEMENTS
We are now taking face to face bookings for the remainder of 2023 with many people already booking slots for the final quarter of this year.
The next three months are already filling up fast as is September and October, so please get in touch as soon as possible if you are thinking of running something in those months.
Virtual and face to face engagements are already in the diary including dates with British Gymnastics, British Sailing, Cricket Scotland, Sunderland Football Club, Hamilton Gymnastics Club, Welsh Gymnastics, Bath Rugby, Wolverhampton Wanderers, Bath Rhythmic Gymnastics, Club, IAPS, Badminton England, Radnor House School, Sherborne School, Denstone College, Edinburgh Academy, George Watson’s, Pocklington School and Scottish Curling.
Please contact [email protected] or call us directly on (+44) 7897517671 if you would like to discuss specific requirements or make a booking.
EXCLUSIVE FOR MEMBERS - MEET THE PARENTS
This month saw the release of Episode 4 in our new video series for members running throughout 2023. The ‘Meet the Parent’ series features sports parents whose children compete at a variety of different levels in different sports across the world.
Episode 4 saw sports parent Wendy Purdie join Gordon MacLelland to discuss all things sports parenting in the world of gymnastics.
It is a journey full of highs and lows that has seen her daughter Shannon Archer battle with injuries and show incredible resilience along the way. This culminated in Shannon becoming Scotland's first ever individual women's Commonwealth Games artistic gymnastics medal by claiming bronze.
To watch the video click here.
We hope that you have enjoyed this mini-edition of the newsletter.
To see the full newsletter you will need to subscribe at www.parentsinsport.co.uk
If you would like to leave us any feedback, a review either on the website or on facebook, or even contact me directly on [email protected] about any aspect of our work then we would love to hear from you.
Gordon MacLelland CEO