Paul Hunter Foundation Unites Communities In East Lancashire

The Paul Hunter Foundation has been successful in achieving funding for projects for The Well Being, Prevention, and Early Help Service for BME Youth Work in the Burnley, Pendle, Hyndburn, Rossendale and Preston areas.

This innovative proposal from the Paul Hunter Foundation has been put together with the support of young representatives of the BME community and NLTG.

It supports an inclusive approach to bringing communities together through snooker via the Foundation’s activities.

The Foundation has grown grass roots snooker across the UK, led by Chris Lovell, the team at NLTG, WPBSA World Snooker coaches and volunteers. Snooker itself has exploded across Europe in the last six years with full and extensive coverage provided by broadcast partner Eurosport.

Through snooker, the Foundation strives to give the young people the opportunity to develop and improve their confidence, and learn and enhance new skills.

It aims to support the all-round development of participants, their application of maths skills, and develops relationships with other people. The foundation targets both able bodied and disadvantaged children equally and also aims to increase their self-esteem and teach the responsibility of contributing to society in a positive manner.

In each area there will be a 15 session programme for young people to attend, each session will last for two hours and will be flexible to meet the needs of the area and will be held in local community venues, allowing the provision to be delivered in the evenings, at weekends or during holiday periods.

Each young person that completes the programme will receive a snooker cue and case. All young people will have the opportunity to take part in weekly bite sized fun sport activities including mini competitions such as the sixty second challenge, team relay games and shoot-out snooker, applying the proven model used previously within Lancashire and throughout the county since 2008.

Progress and attitude will be rewarded as ‘Star of the Night’ certificates will be issued to celebrate supplementary achievements of effort, sportsmanship and supporting others. Opportunities will exist to lead small activities under full supervision for young people who excel and show potential in the initial stages of leadership.

All young people will have the opportunity to achieve an accreditation in Basic Snooker Skills from the WPBSA, with a targeted 80% achievement rate.

Help will be sourced within the local communities to support any specialist needs, by young people that want to attend.

During the sessions, invitations to the police, drugs awareness and sexual health teams will be made to enable young people to feel comfortable and confident to access these services in a relaxed environment.
Expert delivery will be given by the Paul Hunter Foundation team on snooker skills together with information, advice and guidance provided by qualified and skilled professionals throughout the programme.

Additional employability skills which signpost a positive outcome will also be included.

Celebration events will be held during the early part of November, featuring six times World Snooker Champion Steve Davis who will join the team and visit each area to meet the young people taking part and support any community initiatives where possible.

On behalf of the Foundation, Chris Lovell said: “This is a valuable piece of work during challenging times for these communities. Snooker has always been an inclusive sport that has welcomed anyone to take part. The successful achievement of these projects is down to the hard work of the team during the past years, the partnerships developed in the communities and the support of NLTG, LCC, World Snooker and the WPBSA. Our vision is to bring the people of Lancashire together and everyone is already looking forward to meeting Steve in November, it’s given them all something to and look forward to.”

Further information regarding this project is available from Chris Lovell ([email protected]).

Urgent appeal for snooker tables.
We require a small number of snooker tables which will be left in the areas where these projects are being delivered. Ideally we are looking for 7/8/9/12 ft tables in good condition. Initially we would like to only hear from people in Lancashire to minimise transportation and fitting costs. If you can or know of anybody that can donate these free of charge please contact Chris Lovell by e-mail [email protected]