Inclusion was a prominent theme at the recent Welsh Colleges Sport Conference held at Cardiff Metropolitan University on Friday 12th June with over 200 Further Education (FE) students, 50 sport staff and several representatives from local authorities, NGBs and other partner organisations in attendance.
The focus of the day was on developing and promoting new sport and physical activities in Further Education and providing an opportunity for students and staff to identify new activities, projects and funding opportunities and for invited organisations to find out more about the FE sector, current projects and potential partnerships.
As part of the opening ceremony, Jon Williams (Platinum Young Ambassador from Merthyr Tydfil) delivered an inspiring speech based on his experiences in sport as a young disabled person who sent out a powerful message when he quoted “I can’t do everything but I can do sport.”
Following the opening ceremony, FE students and staff had the opportunity to participate in and learn the inclusive activities of Inclusive Zone Basketball delivered by Dan Bufton from British Wheelchair Basketball; Sitting Volleyball was coached by Ieuan Coombes and Kayleigh Phillips from Swansea Inclusive Futures and finally James Ledger, Disability Sport Wales’ Inclusive Futures Intern, delivered a sample session from the Sainsbury’s Active Kids for All training resource.
The Sainsbury’s Active Kids 4 All (SAK4A) is one of many training opportunities offered by Disability Sport Wales and is an excellent resource for both students and teaching staff. If the college network wish to find out more information on this training to encourage and support inclusive delivery within their sport programmes, please visit the learn section of our website.
Disability Sport Wales would like to thank Rob Baynham from Colleges Wales / Colegau Cymru for embedding inclusion as part of their conference and for supporting the college network to grow awareness, capacity and knowledge of inclusive practice through our education and training programmes to ensure an inclusive approach is taken to all activities from the start.
