National Recognition for St. Mary’s School and Bambisanani Partnership
St. Mary’s Menston and the Bambisanani Partnership have been recognised at The Youth Sport Trust 25th Anniversary Awards Dinner held at the Ricoh Stadium in Coventry.
At the prestigious event the school and partnership gained a commendation in the ‘Outstanding Contribution to Community Award’. Catherine Chattoe, Bambisanani Coordinator at St. Mary’s and Barbara Pounder, Trustee of the Bambisanani Partnership charity attended the event of behalf of the school and partnership.
St. Mary’s started the partnership back in 2006 with Mnyakanya High School which is based in one of South Africa’s most deprived rural areas. The partnership, which uses sport as a catalyst to promote education, health, global citizenship and leadership, has gained both national and international acclaim for it ground breaking work.
The independent nomination for the award said:
“Not only has the partnership between the two schools grown, but St. Mary’s has reached out to its community of schools in Leeds, involving students and staff from the School Sport Partnership and two local universities – Leeds Trinity University and the University of Leeds – while Mnyakanya involves children and young people from multiple schools across the region. The partnership’s work is now vast and constantly developing. It includes sports leadership, sports festivals, cycling initiatives and sports coaching but it has also used sport as a catalyst for so much more: literacy and numeracy projects, curriculum development, support for orphans, further education support and promoting employability. The impact on everyone involved – adults and young people – is immeasurable but includes improved health and wellbeing, educational achievement and exemplary citizenship. Above all, St. Mary’s has demonstrated the power of sport to build communities – locally and globally – in which young people, whatever their background, can contribute and thrive.”
Over the past fourteen years over 10,000 UK and South African students have participated in Bambisanani activities, over 280 students from the UK have travelled to South Africa as volunteers to deliver the various Bambisanani programmes, over 775 South African students have gained the Bambisanani Leadership Award and over 2,750 South African students have taken part in Bambisanani Sports Festivals.
““I am extremely proud of the work of St. Mary’s and The Bambisanani Partnership. The teams involved have worked incredibly hard over the last fourteen years and enabled such a transformation in our local community and globally. The impact has been immense. They are thoroughly deserving of this national recognition.””
““This really is a fantastic achievement and thanks must go to our small army of volunteers and supporters who make all these things happen. It was fitting that Catherine and Barbara represented us at the prestigious event; their contribution to this valuable work over the years has simply been immense. We have worked closely with the Youth Trust and without their initial input, as part of the ‘Dreams and Teams’ programme, this work would not even have begun. It was therefore a great honour indeed to be included the very special 25th Anniversary Awards. St. Mary’s deserves the highest praise for being prepared to put its values into action.”
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