THE POWER OF SPORT CAN INSPIRE HOPE EVEN WHEN ALL SEEMS LOST
When she’s not setting records and winning medals as an elite para-athlete, KAYLEIGH HAGGO is helping kids overcome barriers and realise their own hidden potential
ALIGHT turns on. A life changes. Just as it did with her. Kayleigh Haggo had her own Eureka moment as an 11-year-old, turning up at a ‘come-and-try’ event for school pupils with additional support needs, gaining an introduction to the world of race-running — propelling yourself forward in a frame with three wheels, a saddle and a chest plate — and starting a journey which has led to her current status as world and European champion and multiple world-record holder.
Now, delivering these lightning bolts of revelation in others has become her bread and butter. Her daily focus. The central plank of her other life, her working life, away from being one of the planet’s most successful para-athletes.
Haggo, diagnosed with cerebral palsy as a toddler, uses her personal experience of the transformative effect of sport in her day job as a project co-ordinator with South Ayrshire Active Schools, introducing children with disabilities to physical activity and seeking to open up minds, eyes and opportunities.
There are obvious challenges, bleak conversations, particularly in the midst of a pandemic. Kids who feel they have nothing in front of them because of their condition. Nothing to aim for.
And, yet, how quickly that can change when sport’s unique power becomes apparent and understood. No more than a matter of weeks, insists Haggo, whose in-built, can-do attitude makes her the perfect conduit.
She named the programme she designed for this purpose ‘Inspire’ — and listening to her own description of witnessing a young person emerge from the darkness to realise what life really can hold in store certainly does that.
‘It can be tough when you meet a young person who is really down about themselves because of their disability and saying that they can’t do anything, can’t do this, can’t do that,’ she said.
‘It can take a while. When a young person says: “I can’t do that”, my reply is: “No, you can’t do that... yet!”.
‘The word “yet” is really, really important. And when they understand what “yet” really means, the mindset changes.
‘I just want them to think: “Maybe I can do that”. Then, we can look at figuring out a way. Once they achieve it, it becomes about going back and showing them what they’ve done. Showing them they could do it.
‘That can happen in weeks. Honestly. It is about perseverance. You work with the parents, the support team at home, and the schoolteachers — they really play a big part in it as well.
‘It is about making sure it is carried through in their home life and their school life and not just when they come to the sports club.
‘If I speak to parents, I will tell them: “We are trying to make soand-so realise that anything is possible and trying to get away from the attitude that they can’t do it or they don’t know how to do it or whatever”. If the parents and school staff know that and work with that, you would be surprised with how quickly that can change.
‘Is it like a light going on? I think so, yeah. If I have a young person or a child who feels they can’t do things, we work, first of all, to build confidence. When they do an activity, I will video it. It is important for them to see themselves doing it. Just a wee video, if you are down or having a bad week, can really lift you back up again.
‘I’ve always had a really positive attitude from when I was younger and that is thanks to my mum, who always pushed me to be independent and do what I wanted.
‘I have a real growth mindset and I like to prove that anything is possible. There may be barriers, but it is about how you overcome them and who helps you with that. Getting that across to others is part of my job.
‘I feel a lot more confident about myself than I did before trying sport and it has opened up a lot of opportunities for me. To say it changed my life is an understatement.
‘Before I started at the age of 11, I didn’t do anything. I didn’t do any PE at school at all, really. I loved my school and still go back there, but it just wasn’t inclusive.
My personality was that I wanted to do things, but my mum used to get phone calls telling her I was adamant that I wanted to jump off gym equipment.
‘I just wanted to do what everyone else was doing and my mum always fought my corner.
‘When I went to the academy, we went to that “come and try” event once a year for people with additional support needs and, for me, it was the best day of the year.
‘I waited all year for that day to come around, but, at that point, I didn’t know what was out there in disability sport.
‘I got talent-spotted at one of these days and they phoned my mum to ask: “Where has Kayleigh been?”. Within a year, I was competing in my first international and brought home four gold medals. I think I was 12.’
Haggo, a product of Maybole and a graduate in sports coaching and development, is waiting for the expected news that racerunning will become part of the Paralympics for Paris in 2024. That would allow her to become a fully-funded athlete and take her sporting life to an entirely new level.
‘It can be tough when you meet a young person who is really down about themselves because of their disability. When a young person says: “I can’t do that”, my reply is: “No, you can’t do that... yet!”
However, she will not turn her back on her vocation. She has come so far with her Inspire project that she is not willing to let it go.
‘I separate, mentally, my athlete life from my working life — and it really makes my day when I come back with a gold medal from a world or European Championship and take it in to some of the clubs that I organise to see the children’s little faces,’ she smiled. ‘It is amazing.
‘I am involved in supporting what ASN schools are doing, but I also go into mainstream schools to work with teachers who are maybe struggling to include someone who is in their class who may have a disability.
‘I hope I do get the news I can aim for the Paralympics, but I will remain part of Inspire. I will just cut down my hours.’
Haggo knows how much there still is to do to offer adequate opportunities to disabled young people. A special report in Sportsmail in August detailed how only one in ten children classified with a disability, according to the Observatory for Sport in Scotland, are even semi-regular participants in sport.
‘One in ten is not a lot and I just hope we can get people regularly involved in sports in the years ahead,’ she added. ‘It is not about getting to the Paralympics. It is about having fun, meeting new people and getting those mental benefits of feeling better about yourself.
‘The report didn’t surprise me. Disability sport is growing and improving, but it still has a long way to go and having role models is really important for future generations.
‘It is also important for older people who maybe haven’t tried disability sport to see anything is possible and that there are organisations that can help them.
‘There are a lot of barriers. The main one is probably money for equipment. Most sports within disability sport require some sort of adaptive equipment that needs to be made or tailored to suit.
‘You can’t buy it off the shelf, so to speak. There is also the issue of transport. Facilities are definitely improving in terms of disabled access and it is much better than ten or 15 years ago, and the more people we can train up to make sure everyone is included, the better.’
Yet, the role we can all play is a key element of Haggo’s message, too. And a sign-off we can all bear in mind as we go about our daily lives.
‘Everyone plays a part, even if they don’t think they do,’ she reasoned. ‘It could be something as simple as going into a supermarket and maybe just making sure a disabled person can get round the aisles.
‘You might walk down the street and feel someone is staring at you — or not being very nice —— and it can affect your confidence. These are small things, but important.’