CLUB DEVELOPMENT

Suffolk Sport aims to provide support and advice for the county's sports clubs. Below is information about various areas where we can offer guidance, but if you have a general query please feel free to contact Vicki Askew, Sports Development Manager on 01502 523632 or vicki.askew@waveney.gov.uk

Community Amateur Sports Club

To find what your local authority can do to help promote the scheme,

please visit the following link

http://www.cascinfo.co.uk/localauthorities

Club Directory

Suffolk Sport is working in conjunction with the King Edward VI School Sport Partnership to provide a county-wide web-based Club Directory. This will enable clubs to publicise their details on the internet, and the public to identify clubs in their local area. This work is currently underway, but please bear with us while we collate and publish the information. To view the Club Directory please click HERE

Clubmark

Sport England Clubmark is a cross sport accreditation programme for clubs with junior sections. By gaining Clubmark accreditation, your club can prove to members, potential members, parents and schools that you offer a quality environment for young people to improve their sporting skills. For more information about Clubmark click HERE.

Child Protection

As we are sure you are already aware, child protection is a very important issue within sport. All sports clubs should adopt a child protection policy, which outlines what they will do to ensure the safety and welfare of junior members. Suffolk Sport has produced 'Implementing a Child Protection Policy - A Guide for Sports Clubs', which provides advice about putting your policy into practice. It also includes a sample policy if your club doesn't already have one. To download this guide, click HERE.

Running Sport

'Running Sport' is Sport England's education and training programme for sports volunteers. It aims to help volunteers run their clubs as effectively as possible, through a series of workshops and free resources addressing such issues as volunteer management, club finances and development planning. Suffolk Sport runs Running Sport courses as part of its annual workshop programme. These are heavily subsidised and take place around the county. For details of our current workshop programme, click HERE.

You can download the Running Sport resources for free, and access lots of other useful information and advice, from the Running Sport Website

Supporting Your Club's Coaches

Coaches are the life-blood of sport and the backbone of sports clubs. It is important that clubs are able to recruit enough coaches to operate effectively, but it is also important that these coaches are supported to help them develop and to ensure that they remain committed to your club. Suffolk Sport, in conjunction with Cambridgeshire and Peterborough Active Sports Partnership, has produced 'Employing Coaches - A Good Practice Guide for Paid and Voluntary Coaches'. This takes organisations through the entire process of recruitment, selection and support, and is full of useful information and examples. To download a free copy of this guide (1.3mb), click HERE.

Volunteers

Like coaches, clubs wouldn't survive without their other volunteers. For advice about recruiting new volunteers for your club, click HERE.