York St John supports North Yorkshire Youth Games
On Sunday 4 July, 1,000 young people from North Yorkshire
competed in the 11th annual North Yorkshire Youth Games
held at Queen Margaret’s School in Escrick, sponsored by York St
John University.
The Youth Games is one of the most important
fixtures in the county’s sporting calendar. Young athletes along
with disabled athletes represented all Local Authority areas within
the county, across 9 different sports including Gymnastics, Netball
and Cheerleading.
The journey to the games began six months ago
for some of the participants when competitions were opened to
children across the county of North Yorkshire. Thousands of young
people aged between 8 and 16 years competed in interschool
competitions and festivals to find the best representative teams
for their district.
As headline sponsors for the Youth Games in
2010 and 2011, the University aims to build on its strong
relationship with North Yorkshire Sport and raise aspirations
amongst those young sporting stars who would not necessarily view
higher education as an option for them.
Michelle Jones, Head of Subject for Sport at
York St John University said:
“We are delighted to support local talent by
sponsoring the Youth Games and it was fantastic to see so many
young people participating in a wide range of sports. The
sponsorship of the Youth Games highlights our strategy to have a
positive impact on the local and regional community through
partnership and community engagement.”
She added: “It was also great to engage with
the volunteers, teachers, coaches and development officers and was
fantastic to see how many York St John graduates were involved. The
Youth Games is the ideal celebration event for young people to
engage in sports and we aim to contribute to the youth talent
development programme through our gifted and talented camps,
workshops and coach education programmes.”
David Watson, Director of North Yorkshire
Sport said:
“The Youth Games represents an important step
towards developing more talented athletes in the region through a
competitive but safe environment which can ultimately lead to
regional and national representative honours.
“Every young person involved in the Games, from those who attend
district festivals and Competitions to the event itself will be
signposted to local clubs and groups to enable them to continue in
their chosen sport which will hopefully lead to lifelong
participation.”
For further information please contact Amy Hall, PR
& Communications Officer on T: 01904 876466 or E: a.hall@yorksj.ac.uk