we have had over 5000 people take part in wheelchair sports in under 3 months…
Here is what we did ….
Brighton and Hove city council were the biggest sponsors of the project so the majority of this program has been delivered in the city, it was launched at the Take part schools event with 40 schools coming to Whitehawk city school on April 25th, that’s why our trailer is Branded up with the Brighton + Hove Council logo and the Pathway program is known as the B+H Rolling Sports Pathway.
Apr 25th
Take part Schools Fest in Brighton –
Below is a picture of my son looking for typos on the new leaflets at the launch of the program at Whitehawk school at our table… he found 3 typos
Whitehawk is an area of East Brighton where i live and is geographically and socially one of the poorest communities in the UK where a huge health divide is in place compared to other areas of the city. The manor gym in East Brighton is where I started running wheelchair basketball fun sessions a year before the Wheelchair Basketball team was launched.
Apr 26th
like anything I do … we already had a whole program of events lined up long before the launch…
let’s get kids playing playing wheelchair basketball in the freedom leisure sports hall situated close to the grounds of the school, this was the 1st of a 6 session deal that will see the kids with disabilities play a range of wheelchair sports with their able-bodied friends, to help inclusion and confidence.
May 1st
Collyers – Wow these kids were fit… we certainly had an awesome match on our hands when we took the trailer to Horsham for the first time… the event was a great way to meet a few contacts in Horsham and thanks to this little event that we are now looking to do some regular training at this venue as part of “project 4k” Horsham
https://www.instagram.com/p/Bw7AWusAj10/?igshid=o016r5pnmn1d
May 10th
Portslade… Back to freedom leisure in portslade for more amazing kids to play some wheelchair basketball
May 11th
Lancing – Every year the Sussex Bears running basketball teams have an awards day… what an awesome opportunity to get all the “other” non wheelchair basketball teams to have a go at the wheelchair basketball game… with over 300 players playing for the Sussex Bears across all the teams by uniting everyone in sports wheelchairs we could promote wheelchair sports to a captive audience!
We never know what the future holds for kids so lets show them whatever health conditions could happen in the future you can still enjoy basketball at the Sussex Bears.
May 16th
The Manor Gym networking – an awesome event where we got the active community development workers all to have a go at wheelchair basketball! imagine having all these communities going out telling everyone they meet about wheelchair basketball… the link below is more information on this event.
https://www.trustdevcom.org.uk/news/wheels-coffee-croissants/
May 17th
Hove Cricket Day – 500 kids with disabilities in one place … all the schools, carers and professional cricketers too…
We were always going to make it there with the trailer load of chairs and over the 6 hours we had 100’s of kids in sports chairs throwing basketballs about and playing wheelchair cricket. More info on discover-ability day can be found below.
https://sussexcricket.co.uk/discoverability-day
May 24th
Portslade – Back for the 3rd of 6 sessions and this time we thought we could have a little spin at wheelchair rugby in the sunshine … bit of fun , bit of pushing and just helping kids with disabilities play sports with some friends
June 5th
Over 1200 GCSE PE students from all over West Sussex visited this epic huge day of everything sport, fitness and health.
Wheelchair basketball was packed and over 5 hours we never had an empty sports chair…
BUT the most amazing part of this event was all schools that came all tweeted, shared photos of the kids playing wheelchair basketball so it got loads of interested in the sport!
Many thanks to Albion in the Community for the invite to come along to this event today – collaboration is key to exposing more people to disability sports
June 12th
Portsmouth FBA – How ever could the Sussex Bears say no … even though this school is outside of Sussex… we could never say no to a school in Hampshire when another wheelchair basketball team Enable Ability asked us to bring our trailer of sports chairs along…
Just look at the link below and the smiles on all the kids faces when we got them having fun, fun, and more fun playing wheelchair sports…
There are other teams in this area of the country so hopefully today’s event will help to promote those teams in Hampshire
https://www.fbacademy.co.uk/news/?pid=1&nid=1&storyid=4439
June 13th
K2 Crawley staff day… with any amazing facilities like the K2 Crawley the key to getting them talking about wheelchair basketball is to get some staff to experience the sport for themselves…
Once we got them having a go it was only going to lead in to more collaboration and exactly a year and day later we are holding South East Region Legacy games here at the K2 Crawley as part of “Project 4k”
June 14th
Portslade- this time some fun games that combined wheelchair basketball with wheelchair netball … as we only had netball hoops… the kids loved it and had loads of fun.
June 22nd
Brighton Take part day is huge attracting 5000+ people… a few of the Sussex Bears players came along and we set up a few basketball games right in the middle of the entire event
the best bit as always is the social media and exposure afterwards ….
June 28th
Portslade – wheelchair fun and skills in the sunshine on a netball court with lots kids and teachers
July 3rd
Benfield school – amazing kids today playing wheelchair basketball and a great connection to make as we are hoping to do many more events here.
July 6th
Woodard Stock Festival – Sir Robert Woodard Academy have gone above and beyond since we launch our team here so when we asked last minute to bring wheelchair sports to the yearly festival we had to say yes!
July 7th
K2 Crawley disability day… pictures say more than words sometimes and below is a photo showing loads of people trying wheelchair basketball for the first time ever
July 10th
Goldstone school in Hove, spent the morning with some lovely kids
July 12th
PACA in Portslade they have been a big supporter of this program and i think we may have a couple of new young players that will be coming along to our Friday sessions after building up the confidence today.
July 14th
Disability Pride – taking some sports chairs to the Hove Lawns to get as many people as we can to have a spin.
Another 100 people at least all had a go including the local PCSO and St John Ambulance… so they will go spread the message of the team far and wide.
July 16th
Hove Park school in Brighton – we managed to get over 180 kids all to have a go today as we stayed at the school the entire day…
Wheelchair Basketball school TAKE OVER …. amazing experience for all the kids to try some wheelchair basketball
July 16th
Transpride – Brighton Manor Gym
Wheelchair basketball is a fully inclusive sport for everyone… today was the world’s first Transpride wheelchair basketball day we had a full sport hall, loads of fun, fitness, pushing and shooting and a really great game at the end!
July 17th
SRWA – Kids disability sports day and launch of the multi wheelchair sports academy. We had wheelchair tennis and wheelchair basketball for the students to try out while we celebrated the end of the Bears on the Road and brought the trailer home to Lancing
ITV News returned today to catch up on the amazing story of the schools program and the Bears On The Road promotion. we will add that news story link here soon