Blackpool FC Community Trust column: Establishing ways we can continue to help our schools

After last week’s column was written it was announced that the PE and School Sport Premium has been extended to include the new academic year.

This now means the team is working around the clock to discuss our agreements with local primary schools and how we can support again from September.

This work is normally done around April time, so we are obviously behind schedule on this because of the pandemic and the delay in the government confirming if the funding is in place.

Hopefully all can be agreed in time before schools break up for the summer.

From initial conversations, it has already become apparent that our delivery may still need to look a little different in September with us having to continue to utilise some digital delivery, while schools get safety procedures and protocols in place for all pupils returning from that point.

We also had to take the very disappointing decision to cancel our traditional Summer Sports Camps for July and August.

After already missing the Easter and May school holidays, we brought staff back from furlough to investigate safe and appropriate ways to try to reinstigate this support for families over the six-week period.

However, with the school facilities we usually utilise needing to close for repairs and staff holidays, and us having no alternative venues – plus the current government guidance around bubbles and social distancing – it makes it almost impossible for us to deliver the service.

We are greatly disappointed and understand how many families this lets down for childcare support, so if we are to keep to safety protocols and guidance, the service and usual activity would not be the same and would mean a much greater cost to each family too.

So we send our sincere apologies to all that normally take part and hope to be back up and running for October half-term.

We will be announcing some summer activity taking place very soon, in partnership with a host of local organisations.

On a more positive note, we were able to return more of our team back to work this past week to focus on a few of our returning services for the summer months.

These include NCS, which will have a focus on getting young people aged 15-17 to ‘Keep Doing Good’ and engage in some local social action, a new programme with the EFL Trust and DCMS to tackle isolation and hopefully – subject to funding agreements – some summer activities for our primary, secondary and disabled young people to enjoy safely.

We hope to be able to announce everything with full details very soon and have the full workforce back in and active by the start of August.

Through all the work we are putting in place, we continue to develop programme-specific delivery guidance for staff and thorough Covid-19 risk assessments, so the team has had to hit the ground running to make sure we keep all our staff and participants safe at all times.

Busy – but exciting – times ahead.