Trust Rugby Tours
A story by Trust Rugby International
Trust Rugby has developed Tri Tours working with players aged 15-21, by taking groups on day and overnight trips to learn rugby and interact with peers to develop social skills allowing individuals to achieve their goals, build confidence and empower individuals.
This will also give parents and carers the opportunity to relax knowing that the person is in a safe environment.
What Trust Rugby Tours did
The people involved with activities were identified via our partnership networks e.g local authority education, and voluntary groups and people who attend regular training sessions.
During the course of the year we have taken groups of people with learning disabilities to Ulster to compete in the Wooden Spoon Tag Festival, visited Edinburgh to play against other rugby teams, e.g Fettes College, Edinburgh Accies, and hosted a week long development camp as part of the annual tri Unions Festival in Ayrshire.
We also delivered sessions as part of the after school curriculum and attended a Scotland rugby international game. We also organised a weekend development camp in Edinburgh, which included playing a competitive match between two of the Ayrshire Schools, followed by a tour of Murrayfield, which some of the people would not have had the opportunity previously.
Many of the parents and carers used their non-caring time to enjoy catching up with family, shopping, sightseeing in Edinburgh and also going away for a weekend trip. Parents of children participating in the after school sessions, allowed them to have 90 minutes of free time to do as they wished or some people did not have to leave work early.
What Trust Rugby International has learned
We have learned that we have to invest in administration and evaluation processes by allocating suitable resources to these areas.
Given the target audience that we work with, any new projects should have a slightly longer lead in time, given some of the challenges that we faces within the first part of the funding term.
Revisit some of the transport issues and look to invest in our own vehicle that will allow us to pick up participants at ad-hoc times, as transport seems to be a continual barrier in certain areas and with individuals and their carers.