About Us
Our Work
There is no shortage of ideas, drive and enthusiasm to develop initiatives. Accessing the funds and resources to turn those initiatives into tangible activities, can be a difficult and frustrating task, especially for young people who are anxious to see their hopes and plans come to fruition. We seek to support them in the provision of funds through various means including partnership arrangements with fundraising professionals and commercial enterprise.
- Citizenship
We support projects, which seek to develop children and young people into good and active citizens who can make a positive contribution to their communities. These will include activities to tackle social exclusion, truancy, bullying, working with excluded pupils and many other community-based initiatives.
- Police Community Clubs
We support numerous Police Community Clubs. As a requirement, each club must have at least one serving or retired police officer or Community Support Officer on their management committee. The rationale around this requirement is four fold:
Where projects are the subject of applications for funding, the officer[s] must ensure that such projects fall within or compliment ‘local crime reduction strategies’;
The officer[s] ensure that any funding provided is spent in the manner outlined in the application and;
The officer[s] ensure that any project supported, is capable of being sustained by the group ‘after’ its completion;
The officer[s] facilitate a close working relationship with the local Police Commander and/or their staff.
- Further Education Scholarships – Further Education Sports Academies
Where appropriate we seek to fund at various levels, young people through scholarships at Further Education [FE] Sports Academies. The FE Academies provide up to three year academic or vocational courses, which integrate various sports within the curriculum. Staffed by the country’s finest coaches provided by Sport England, these youngsters are in many cases, given a ‘second chance’ whilst being given the opportunity to excel in their chosen sport.
Our policy is to identify prospective students from within ‘The Clubs’ however, worthy cases identified by police officers ‘working with disadvantaged young people’ are always considered from outside our organisation.
Our latest and ‘flagship’ partnership in this field is with the Bradford College in West Yorkshire where we have jointly supported the college through the formation of the Boxing scholarship and Boxing Academy now named The Bradford Police and College Boxing Academy.
We also part fund the World Class Coach and have based our national Development Officer at this College who is funded both by ourselves and Bradford College.
- Provision of Educational Material
With the help of educationalists and other experts in their respective fields, we produce educational material which addresses ‘current’ subjects that support and compliment learning for children, their
parents and teachers alike.
Some of the subjects currently addressed are Bullying, Vandalism, Bereavement, Personal Safety, Drugs, Tobacco and Alcohol, Citizenship, Racism, Weapons and Children and Young People’s Safety on the WWW.
New titles are continually being introduced therefore you are advised to contact our central office on 01237 471 615 to learn of all new publications.
Whenever possible we endeavour to provide these publications, free of charge to children, parents, schools, hospitals, clubs etc.
In order to be able to do this, we engage sales companies who identify persons, companies or organisations that purchase them on behalf of the recipients. In recent months, the popularity of the publications has seen them being purchased directly by schools from their own resource budgets.
If you would like to purchase any of these publications please call our central office on 01237 471 615
Alternatively, please contact our partner/contractor at Community Initiative Associates for details and/or purchase of our expanding portfolio on educational material and projects.
We are all aware of the dangers that prevail on the streets of our towns and cities, particularly for children, young people and females. We distribute as widely as possible attack alarms to the most vulnerable.
- Criminal Records Bureau [CRB] Checks
‘The Clubs’ have a strict policy that all persons who are involved in the supervision or caring of children and young people within ‘all’ of our own or sponsored activities shall be ‘checked’ through the Criminal Records Bureau [CRB].
To this end, we are a Registered and Umbrella Body within the CRB. As such we not only ensure a safe environment for our own children and young people, we also encourage and offer [for a reasonable administrative fee] the provision of CRB checks to other organisations upon request.
If you wish to discuss the CRB service we provide, please call our office on
01237 471 615 or contact our CRB e-mail on: policecc@aol.com
- Project – ‘Stolen Lives’
This interactive Community based project addressing Gun, Knife and Gang Crime was rolled out by ‘The Clubs’ on behalf of The Metropolitan Police and Home Office to twelve London Boroughs during 2009 / 2010. The success of this project has been acknowledged nationwide and has generated interest throughout the England, Wales and Scottish Police Service.
For further details please contact our central office on 01237 471 615
- Project ‘Sports Clubs in the Muslim Community’
Working with the UK wide Muslim community and in collaboration with the Home Office we have formed sports clubs [predominately Olympic style amateur boxing] within mosques or the vicinity of Mosques. This programme has proved very successful and variations of the programme have been successful in London, Thames Valley and West Yorkshire.
- Project – ‘Contender Am Box’
This exciting project designed, risk assessed and is marketed by ‘The Clubs’ was piloted by the Metropolitan Police Territorial Support Group during the school’s summer holidays of 2008 – 2009 and 2010.
Designed to provide a pathway into sports clubs, this is a bespoke project delivered in modules of 1 to 15 days or as an ‘after school’ project provides diversionary activities for school children between 12 and 16 years. This pilot has proved to be a resounding success.
Whilst the programme is now firmly based throughout the country, in order to extend the delivery across Greater London, we engaged and trained over 100 police officers and PCSOs who now hold Sport National Governing Body [NGB] qualifications and have delivered to over 500 children and young people throughout London. Similar programmes have been delivered in West Yorkshire and other Police Service areas.
Importantly, this is not a police specific delivery and correctly trained NGB Leaders and Coaches can and do deliver throughout the country.
The programme includes non contact Olympic style boxing together with Citizenship modules which include
All those subjects previously mentioned in this document ie: Bullying, Vandalism, Bereavement, Personal Safety, Drugs, Tobacco and Alcohol, Citizenship, Racism, Weapons and Children and Young People’s Safety on the WWW.
As this is entirely designed to be bespoke to the group / area of delivery, the Citizenship element can be focused on subject of specific choice. It is therefore entirely flexible in its delivery and content.
As with our other projects, if you require any further information, please contact our central office on 01237 471 615, we will be pleased to visit you in order to provide an in depth insight into this and other project work.
- Project – ‘Leader’
This project which was again designed, risk assessed and is marketed by ‘The Clubs’ in order to provide a pathway into the sport of Olympic style amateur boxing as a coach. This one day delivery provides all the necessary skills to enable the student to progress to be a fully registered coach. The qualification attracts full registration to the NGB, CRB registration and authority to deliver the Contender Am-Box programme.
- Project – ’The Police Club’s Community Education Awards’
‘The Clubs’ Community Education Awards is an annual recognition and celebration of schools’ efforts to help children and young people to become positive community members. ‘The Clubs’ use the awards to identify and demonstrate the most innovative and effective programmes currently in use in schools and encourage the development of more projects that will have a positive impact on pupils.
The awards are separated into six categories:
Community, Environment, Finance, Health & Lifestyle, Individual / Mentor and Internet & Technology.
We currently have two brand ambassadors, Esther Rantzen CBE who has campaigned tirelessly for children’s rights for more than 20 years. Having first found fame as the presenter of That’s Life! – the BBC’s long-running consumer programme – she went on to set up ChildLine.
Our other ambassador is Gerry Sutcliffe MP who is the MP for one of the most challenging areas that we are engaged with, Bradford South. Gerry joined us in 2011 and we are extremely pleased to have such an enthusiastic member on the team.
- In Conclusion
The potential benefit of the work carried out by this organisation is huge. It has a national network of ‘volunteer’ professionals to support the development and delivery of projects and a unique means of tapping into the ideas of children and young people. The concept is innovative, focused and at the forefront of current thinking on working with young people, tackling social exclusion and building sustainable communities.
I do hope that this has helped you to understand a little of the structure and work of the Police Community Clubs of Great Britain.
Barry Jones MBE [Founder]
The Police Community Clubs of Great Britain
PO Box 160
Bideford
Devon
EX39 9DL
Telephone: 01237 471 615 Email: policecc@aol.com
For further information – Please visit our Web site at: www.policecommunityclubs.org