MANCHESTER - SEEING IS BELIEVING - APRIL 2009

The commonwealth Games is only 5 years away and already Glasgow and the East End is making preparations for this. There will be major impacts for the community and for the young people of the East End. It has been our aim to develop a partnership with Manchester, a previous host city for the games, so that our young people could gain an understanding and bring this back to the wider community. Playbusters aim to involve between 20/30 young people each year in this project.

In carrying out this proposal we have been working with PMR leisure consultants who are involved in supporting grassroots community organisations. The Seeing is Believing trip 2009 was supported and funded by PMR Leisure, PPD and Manchester City Council Culture and Leisure Services.

This involved taking 21 young people to Manchester where they visited Sports City, the Velodrome and were also fortunate to be given complimentary tickets to the UEFA Cup quarter final - Man City v Hamburg. The young people got to try out a variety of sports activities and they thoroughly enjoyed this. As a result of the feedback from the young people on our return we will be developing further opportunities for them to take part in athletics and other commonwealth sports.

The trip also involved a workshop with architects who explained a bit about their work and got young people involved in some artwork around development of an area. This was a highly enjoyable session and the young people came up with some great ideas. The young people who went along on the trip are currently working on a presentation of their visit to the local community and other interested people.