Hosted by Supporters Direct Scotland
Date: 23rd April 2018
The SPFL Trust prides itself in the fact that Scottish football can now support local communities.
Various Scottish clubs have embraced the idea and supported numerous charities and projects. When football sides shine a light on such good work, it gets more eyes on important causes and that’s a great thing for everyone.
The Trust announced recently that Dunfermline Athletic and The Pars Foundation had won The SPFL Trust’s Community Project of the Year award with their Pars Tackle Health project.
The Pars Foundation promotes a positive outlook towards good health and fitness. They use the club’s professional players as role models as they visit schools delivering the message to young kids, they visited 71% of the local primary schools in the 2017-18 school year.
I think it’s fantastic that a club such as Dunfermline takes the time to give back to the local community and promoting something that we as a society need to do more in terms of educating our youngsters on the benefits of living well and healthy.
I remember growing up in Glasgow’s southside and the Glaswegian clubs and the SFA made very little effort to get involved with the local schools. I always felt that was wrong and a mistake. They could have developed better relations with a generation that often felt overlooked at times. That generation is the one that saw numbers of players playing drop and Scotland’s participation in major tournaments stop.
So it’s terrific to see clubs at all levels being more socially aware and think about all those in our communities.
I always like to see Celtic fans posting pictures of a high volume of carrier bags full of food for food banks. It’s great to see the fans and their club coming together to help the community.
Both Celtic and Rangers have foundations that plough money into various charities.
When I visited Pollok FC earlier in the year, I could see that they were very proud to be an all inclusive club that had projects that benefitted young kids of both genders, that benefitted those less privileged, those in further in education, disabled members of the community and older supporters too. It made me proud that a football team cared so much and put so much effort into giving back.
Hearts have their own charity partners in the Big Hearts Community Trust and you can see through their social media channels that they are constantly promoting great causes and finding new ways to get involved with the local areas that need their help. They allow fans to give back to the community and that’s amazing.
Aberdeen’s Community Trust implemented a project that helped people living with dementia with their Dementia Friendly Wellbeing initiative. It’s huge to have a cause that helps both carers and those that suffer from the disease. We can’t banish these people from society, that only aggravates the problem!
To be honest, I grew up loving football but it had become a business by then and it was quickly distancing it’s self from it’s working class roots and from the local community that had established them as institutions.
I’m personally delighted to see so many clubs and their supporters embracing the idea of giving back to the community and to much needed charitable causes!
By Scott Johnston From TheFootyblog.net
Posted in: Latest News