Lotto boost for club’s charity
THE Vikings Sports Foundation, Widnes Vikings’ affiliated community charity, has secured £20,000 in funding from the Big Lottery Fund and Sport England to expand its community delivery.
The funding, from the ‘Awards For All’ and ‘Small Grants’ programmes respectively, will support the charity to develop and test new interventions that support adults employability skills and enable more young people to participate in rugby league.
From Awards For All, the Foundation have been funded to deliver engagement sessions geared around supporting adults to gain the necessary employability skills to enter work whilst learning the importance of maintaining healthy lifestyles.
From Sport England, the team have been funded to enhance the work of the Friday Stadium Sports Hub to deliver more touch rugby programmes for people aged 14 and above.
Richard Munson, community integrated director at the Vikings commented: “Since its launch, the Vikings Sports Foundation has complemented well the health and education partnerships run by the club.
“It has had an incredibly successful year delivering Sky Try and pioneering a new enterprise initiative with the Rank Foundation to name but two.
“I am grateful to the Big Lottery and Sport England for supporting the new projects which will offer fantastic exit routes for participants from current projects to maintain their participation.
“These projects are the first of a range of new projects coming to fruition for the Vikings Sports Foundation and I look forward to the launch of new projects in the coming months.” ● For more information on the projects, or the work of the Vikings Sports Foundation in general, contact Richard Munson via email richardm@ widnesvikings.co.uk or telephone 0151-495 2250.