Thanks to our ongoing partnership with League Football Education, we will be offering even greater provision across the Football League academy programme for the 2023-24 season.
Following the success of last year’s programme where webinars and workshops were delivered to over 30 clubs in the EFL and along with some incredible feedback, the programme will be extending this coming year to include more live days and sessions.
WWPIS also work with a number of Premier League clubs across both the boys and girls’ programmes.
Alongside the workshop and webinar offering to clubs, every academy, parent and coach will have access to a customised WWPIS & League Football Education website platform.
By being a member of the platform, parents, coaches and athletes can access all of the exclusive WWPIS content including blogs, videos, podcasts, expert interviews, webinars and downloadable resources as well as support and information from League Football Education.
This includes the unique content in the Parent Zone, Coaches Corner and the Holistic Development Area.
The Parent Zone
The ‘Parent Zone’ is the ultimate resource for all sporting parents whether your child is involved at grassroots level or in an academy/pathway programme.
The articles section is written exclusively by the team here at WWPIS and covers a wide range of topics from ‘The car journey home’ to ‘Understanding how our children learn.’
There are regular guest blogs from leading practitioners from around the world as well as a video series, helping support parents further on their sports parenting journey.
The ‘Expert View’ series has been a real hit with parents joining us to ask experts for answers to all of their questions around a range of different topics.
‘Meet the Parents’ brings into the home some real life stories around sports parenting from parents going through the experience with their children. Stories include those in grassroots sport all the way up to those who are playing professionally.
‘Dad – it doesn’t help!’ brings an authentic look at life as a sporting parent with plenty of humour written for us by Australian author Mark Macguire, whose son currently plays in a Major League Baseball franchise.
Website Members’ Area – Holistic Development
The ‘Holistic Development’ area provides specialised information on a variety of topics from leading practitioners in their field, completing a 360 degree guide for parents to help provide the best levels of support for their sporting children.
This area is headed by Maimee Titmuss Morris (UK Sports Institute Performance Lifestyle Coach and well-being lead for the World Class Programme with British Gymnastics) and Jane Holden (UK Sports Institute Lifestyle coach and pathway well-being consultant / mental health instructor for TASS).
Website Members’ Area – Coaches Corner
In ‘Coaches Corner’ there are lots of supplementary resources for the book ‘Engage’ to support coaches with their parental engagement strategy.
Here are a few examples of topics that have been covered:
- What does an ideal parents’ meeting look like?
- Preparing the ground for crucial conversations
- Setting the tone and allowing parental engagement to thrive
- Creating a strategy for effective communication with your parents
- Is your organisation aligned to allow parental engagement to thrive?
- Are parents part of your team or do you leave them on the bench?
- Do you know your players’ parents?
- The playing time conundrum
CEO Gordon MacLelland said, ‘Our work across football has been really well received, not just from our work with parents but also the work we have done with coaches and academy management. Ultimately, we all need to work together to help provide the best possible experiences and environments for young people so they can thrive both on and off the field. The continued growth of our programme with League Football Education will continue to help us to achieve this.
Simon Williams Life Skills Manager LFE said, “We are delighted to build on the partnership with WWPIS and be able to provide more support to the network of parents and carers across EFL academies. It becomes ever clearer that education and support should not start and end with children alone. Parents and carers are an equal part of the experience and guidance on how to manage opportunities and experiences of the academy system needs more exposure. The workshop delivery from WWPIS has received powerful feedback, is having a clear impact and we are now able to accompany this by funding access to the static resource support through the membership area.”
