Who we are
Our centre-based sessions are open access and are co-designed with the young people themselves. Co-designing makes sure our sessions are up to date and relevant to the young people. It also ensures that the young people get the most from the session.
Our sessions include:
- Sports sessions and coaching
- Youth Work including issue based learning
- Play work and developmental sessions
- Creative Arts & Craft
- Nationally important days
- Cultural and diversity
- Education
- Health & Wellbeing
- Healthy eating and cooking
Sports Alive staff work with children and young people providing services that meet their needs by running programmes and projects within in their community
Sports Alive North West charity works with children and young people across Liverpool, Halton & Knowsley running programmes and projects that include centre-based, detached work, outreach, one-one, and group work. We strive to provide these sessions consistently in the communities that need them most.
Safer, stronger, healthier communities.
Our aim is to Enable young people to feel empowered, have a sense of achievement, build their confidence, improve their physical health, have a healthy body & mind, and maintain a high overall wellbeing.
We do this by promoting.
– Eating Well
– Moving and Exercise
– Community cohesion
– Positive attitudes
– Team building
– Maintaining supportive relationships
– Being outdoors
Centre-based sessions: Provides young people with safe spaces, encouraging them to become in touch with their artistic side, develop freedom of expression and use their voice. This allows us to approach and discuss subjects and topics relevant to issues surrounding young people today.
Our sporting programmes and activities allow young people to keep active, promotes team work, learn skills, and increase movement.
Outreach Sessions: is a form of youth work that takes place on young people’s own territory and is a method of work that supports, compliments and promotes new and existing centre-based youth work.
Primarily used to inform young people of services that exist in their locality and to engage and encourage them to use such services.
Outreach can also seek to identify, through consultation with young people, any gaps that exist in services aimed at meeting their needs, Outreach is seen as an extension to centre-based work and takes place when workers who are usually centre-based go onto the streets with an agenda of their own to pursue, usually to encourage young people to attend their club or activity.
Detached youth work is where a youth worker is contracted to work in an area without having any attachment to youth work settings. Such a worker does the majority of their work, wherever young people are to be found.
Detached youth work is not new, It is a method of engaging with young people within their own environment, For example, on the streets, waste ground, open space, shopping parades, pubs, cafes and parks.
Peripatetic Work: This is where a youth worker is contracted to work from several bases or in a number of different settings.
Young person social prescriber for children and young people is about developing non-medical solutions that improve wellbeing, mental health, physical health and connects children and young people to their family, friends and peers.
Social prescribing is an approach that connects people to activities, groups and services in their community to meet the practical, social and emotional needs that affect their health and wellbeing
Meet our Team
CEO
Ryan Manville - BSc Hons
I am the Chief Executive Officer for Sports Alive Northwest and also a Level 3 qualified youth worker. I founded the organisation back in 2010 originally as a sports coaching organisation. After feeling I could do more for the local community I live and work within. At the time this was my main background delivering sports projects to several different communities across Merseyside and where most of my qualifications lay.
As the journey grew around 2 years in we established the need for more youth work within the community. This fell alongside the delivery that we already had running with sports. At this point, I was working as a youth worker both detached and centre-based.
As we grew the demand for more provision become apparent as we saw increases in ASB, poor health, social isolation, an increase in mental health, and a rise in exploitation. This led to the organisation rapidly growing with an increase of funding locally and nationally and more staff/volunteers joining our projects. In 2012 we developed our slogan of “creating Safe, Stronger, and Healthier communities” to help define us and understand more about our local community.
The organisation continued to expand and work with thousands of young people. In March 2020 the impact of covid-19 meant the way that we delivered needed to change. However, this did not phase us and we increased detached work, vulnerable 1 to 1 delivery, and delivered a wide range of home packs with food/activities inside.
I only envision our team growing the organisation and building our provision further to change the lives of our young people and the local community. The organisation is now at the biggest we have ever seen it and is continuing to develop links in new areas and with new partners/ funders wanting to work with us.
Thank You, Ryan.
Deputy CEO
Lianne McGinnes
I have over 15 years experience as a Community Development Manager and facilitator, I am a trained life coach, appreciative inquiry coach, and have a higher education diploma in counselling and psychotherapy.
My passion has always been working with people of any age, being a voice for communities and social justice.
I love working for Sports Alive as it provides a platform for young people to learn about and tackle social issues, helps them develop life skills and engages with the harder to reach youth, giving them a voice to raise issue that are important to them and their local communities.
Operations Manager
Simon Huthwaite
I began working with young people back in 2006 as a rock climbing instructor and spent the next 10 years working with young people in a variety of setting but specialising in working with young people with disabilities. I moved into a management role with a small charity in 2016 and spent the next 8 years as an Operations Manager. This role allowed me to build on my organisational skills and gain a lot of experience in managing Human Resources as well as the more behind the scenes aspects of running an organisation such as good policy and procedure building.
I am passionate about equality and development whether in work or outside of work, and nothing gives me greater pleasure than supporting people and organisations to grow and improve.
I am a proud father and grandfather, and enjoy being in the great outdoors through fishing, rock climbing, walking and running and am particularly passionate about the birds that inhabit these places! I am married to Laura and we have a brilliant lurcher called Tanner.
Administration and Youth worker
Laura Gleeson
I have 5 years of experience working as a project youth worker, I am also a level 2 and level 3 qualified youth worker.
Knowing that I am helping young people change their life is one of the most fulfilling aspects of my job. I believe that my job can have a good impact on young people’s futures and provide them with coping tools to help them overcome difficult circumstances. I really love being a part of a process in which young people, learn more about themselves and discover their purpose.
I love working for Sports Alive as it allows me to help young people to develop fully by engaging with them to encourage their personal, social, and educational development, as well as their ability to develop their voice, influence, and role in society and realise their full potential.
Detached worked
Harry Rainey
Hello my name is Harry Rainey. I’m from Belfast in Northern Ireland. I have had several years of working with young people in Belfast including outreach and detached work. I’m also a qualified teacher, and love having the opportunity to make an impact on the young peoples lives across Liverpool.
YOUTH WORKER
Hayley Perks
I have worked with young people and children for over eight years now. I have worked at a children’s summer camp in America for five summers, as well as teaching English and Sports abroad in Thailand, Cambodia and Uganda. I have also taught English and Physical Education in primary schools around Liverpool throughout university. I have a bachelors degree in Physical Education and School Sport, and also have a Teaching English as a Foreign Language qualification. I have also had lifeguard training.
I really enjoy working for Sports Alive as it allows us to give young people opportunities to learn new skills, make new friendships, develop themselves and to give them chances to develop important life skills. Sports Alive does many things to enable young peoples development such as learning new sports, learning about healthy eating, as well as educating young people about important topics such as internet safety and positive relationships.
Social Prescriber
Siobhan Duckworth
Hello my name is Siobhan, I have been working for Sports Alive for 3 years as a youth worker and most recently as the organisations’ Social Prescriber. I am very passionate about youth work and I love making a difference to the young people in our communities. I always aim to offer young people a safe space to be themselves and find ways to overcome difficulties they experience.
As a trained mental health first aider I use Social Prescribing to offer that extra support for young people to improve their health and wellbeing by connecting them to non-medical support that makes a huge difference. I am also a qualified life coach which as taught me to have time to understand young people’s needs and what matters to them, and then work with them to create a personalised plan.
outreach YOUTH WORKER
Courtney Fry
Youth work to me is important. You are many things. A mentor, adviser, friend many of these young people don’t have these at home so turn to the streets where they become vulnerable and at risk.
I enjoy this type of work as I find it character building. Also, to see the journey some of these young people go through and to see how their life has changed for the better. There is a great deal of people who are not diagnosed with a mental health issue and are suffering in silence and if we (youth workers) were not about the situation will become much worse as we are able to sign post individuals and, in some cases, could be the first point of call.
The satisfaction you get from giving/helping can not be measured.,