Community sports pilot is programmed for success

Jul 9 2009 by Sandra Walls, Hamilton Advertiser

PUPILS from Hamilton schools have given the thumbs-up to South Lanarkshire Leisure’s pilot community sports programme.

The programme, organised in partnership with Hamilton Rugby Club’s development officer Jared Tuoro, ran from April until the end of June at the Bent Recreation Area, was run by Active Schools co-ordinator Paul Graham and was aimed at P4-7 pupils from the Hamilton Grammar cluster.

More than 70 children took part each Wednesday evening, with the P4-5 group playing rugby while the P6-7s concentrated on football.

Paul said: “We targeted boys and girls from the primary schools surrounding the Grammar as we hope these activities will help them with the transition to secondary school.

“All the games took place in a friendly environment and will help to foster good relationships among pupils from different schools.

“We ran this as a pilot scheme and the feedback was very positive.

“Next year, we intend to make the programme bigger and better with more activities and we are aiming to expand it to more than one day.”