Last week I mentioned we had returned to schools and in particular had restarted delivery of our Fit2Go programme in local primary schools.
The reason I raise this again is we have now started our 10th season delivering this amazing programme.
Nine years ago, when I coordinated the implementation of this programme, my daughter Scarlett was not even born, yet she is still able to benefit from Fit2Go as she is currently taking part in the sessions with her classmates at Norbreck Academy and actually started her involvement on my youngest daughter’s first birthday on 17th September. The day was a special one for a number of reasons.
I’m extremely proud we are still delivering Fit2Go, it has evolved to become a strategic influencer and key contributor to reducing childhood obesity in Blackpool. It’s very rare in our area of work to have a project funded for 10 years, so we owe a great deal of gratitude to our partners and financial support from Blackpool Council and NHS for helping us to work with over 13,000 children in the nine period so far.
We also restart our Walking Football programme at PlayFootball on Monday 28th September. This is one of the last provisions to restart and it’s been great to consult with the BFC Senior Seasiders group to put appropriate plans and procedures in place.
We have to ask everyone wanting to take part to follow the booking guidance we have had to implement, which is on our website (www.bfcct.co.uk) and we cannot accept walk ups on the day of sessions, for safety reasons and to make sure we follow FA guidance.
The government restrictions announced by the Prime Minister have also taken up a large amount of my time this week, to understand how they affect us. In the whole, they don’t too much. We can continue all our great work, but ask all participants to remain safe when taking part and staff will make sure facilities and provision is COVID safe.
We have also had to make some adjustments to some of our staffs usual working week and ask a number to spend their usual planning, marking and preparation time away from the office spaces and work from home. In an obvious statement, the teams have been really disappointed to have to do this, but we all understand the importance of doing so, where relevant.
