The FA Hat-Trick Project in Newcastle’s New Deal for Communities area works closely with West Gate Community College.

Only a couple of months after the project kicked off in November 2005, Hat-Trick Officer Mark Oliver was approached by Paul Donaghy, SSCo at West Gate, with a view to running a Junior Football Organisers Course for a group of Year 11 students.

This group of lads who were following an alternative curriculum and working on a ‘Living for Sport’ programme, were not expected to leave school with many GCSE’s between them. However, their love of football helped them to learn valuable skills such as communication, organisation and decision making.

The JFO was a major success and culminated in the ‘West Gate World Cup’ festival which was organised and officiated by the lads themselves.

Following a School-Club Link in the area, seven local primary schools took part, all representing a World Cup country and created costumes, banners and chants which added tremendous colour to the afternoon.

The Hat-Trick project also invited ‘Show Racism the Red Card’ and a local African percussion group to highlight the ‘football for all’ theme of the festival and food technology students provided international healthy snacks for the players and spectators to enjoy.

The pupils who attended all received a goody bag with gifts from New Deal for Communities and information on a brand new football club. I am pleased to report that West Gate Warriors U9s now play competitive mini-soccer every week with a team made up almost entirely of participants from the festival.

All of the above gave Paul and myself reason to believe that it was worth entering the national awards for schools running the ‘Living for Sport’ programme.

Organised by Sky and the Youth Sport Trust, over 500 schools in the UK were involved, so imagine our delight when we were invited to London for the awards ceremony as we had made the top three in the category of ‘Effective Partnership Work’.

Damion Stobbs & Alan White, two of the JFO candidates and now volunteers with Hat-Trick, were ready for their first ever trip to London. We met Dame Kelly Holmes and when she announced we had won first prize in our category you could have almost heard the Geordie roar back on Tyneside!

The FA Hat-Trick regeneration programme has seen then the appointment of 19 community football workers in the most deprived wards in the country, thanks to funding from UEFA and the Govenment.

Their role is to provide a range of football opportunities for young people aged 7-16, while helping to address issues such as health, social exclusion and anti social behaviour.