The North London Muslim Community Centre has been awarded funds from Team Hackney to provide a 27 month youth sports programme under the “Positive Activities For Young People” (PAYP) funding scheme. The NLMCC has named this project “Sports For The Future”.

The aim of this project is to increase sports participation among Hackney’s Muslim youth (male & female) age 13-19, by providing them with a sports activity programme which focuses on Olympic sports. The sports in question will be Football, Table Tennis, 20-20 Cricket and Judo.

Holiday play schemes and residential trips will also be provided during school holiday periods.

There will also be schemes that will provide the projects volunteers with accreditations like an FA level 1 coaching badge and The Duke of Edinburgh award to recognise their positive contributions and achievements.

It is also hoped that by networking with national and local sporting bodies, issues obstructing Muslim involvement in sports on a national, local and recreational level will be raised and addressed.

On a more general level, the project will provide Muslim youth between the ages of 13-19 with an opportunity to engage in constructive activities during their free time, thereby reducing the potential for these individuals to become embroiled in anti social activities or behaviour. This is particularly important at a time when both the Muslim community and youth are under the social spot light for negative reasons.

The project will be delivered by a team of 3 dedicated staff.

The youth development manager will be responsible for strategic planning of the programme.

He will be assisted by 1 male youth sports officers and 1 female youth sports officer. These officers will be responsible for delivering the activities within the programme.

For further information on the “Sports for the Future” project please contact:

Haroon Alibhai on 020 8806 1147 or email youth@nlmcc.org.uk