Success of the Street Games project Swindon


West Wilts Dance Festival 2015


On 25 and 26 February, 34 schools took part in the West Wilts Dance Festival. Over the two evenings, there were over 750 pupils taking part in the Dance Festival. St Breock School came all the way from Cornwall and they performed both evenings. There were also exceptional speeches from both Year 6 pupils, Megan (Minster) and Matilda (Horningsham).


in education and from low income households. By providing this free wide range of opportunities we were able to engage new participants, encourage and inspire them to enjoy these sports and hopefully continue to take part. During the sessions we successful sign posted a majority of these participants to the weekly Street Games sessions or to other sports providers. We therefore would like to say a big thank you to WASP and Sport England for providing this opportunity.


The Street Games Swindon project provides opportunities for young people aged between 14 and 25 years old to get active, make friends, build confidence and focus, by providing free, weekly sessions around Swindon.


Thanks to the great support from Wiltshire and Swindon Sport our County Sports Partnership and Sportivate funding we have been able to extend our offer away from mainstream sport.


Between April 2014 and April 2015 we ran 10 Sportivate taster sessions, including; Street Dance, BMX, Skate Jams and Multi-Sports. A majority of the participants were 16- 25 years old and had come from all different backgrounds in terms of gender and ethnicity. A huge percentage of participants were unemployed or not


Street Games National works with over 600 projects around the UK and has just crowned the Street Games Swindon project as ‘Project Of The Year’. The Swindon project has engaged over 900 participants in weekly sessions and event, with a further 100 within the Sportivate projects (retaining 94), it has also engaged nearly 100 young volunteers. This is a fantastic achievement for the Swindon team and again we must thanks all partners, including WASP and young people involved.


For further information on


Street Games please contact Charlie Johnson -


CJohnson3@swindon.gov.uk


and if you would like to find out more about Sportivate funding contact


Jordan Rose - Jordan@wiltssport.org.uk


The theme of the 2015 Dance festival was children’s books as World Book Day was coming up soon. Crockerton School had their dance based on ‘Pirates of the Caribbean’ and Matravers’ dance was based on ‘Lord of the Flies’. There was even a dance from Wyle Valley KS1 based on the book ‘Guess how much I love you’.


Larkrise School made an emotional impact on the audience with a dance based on the oldest most famous books of all time. All the schools put in a lot of effort with costumes and makeup; Grove school based their dance on ‘Wicked’ with Elphaba and Galinda costumes making their dance realistic and making them look the part. We are open for any suggestions for the theme of next year’s dance.


The 15 Kingdown Dance Ambassadors explain how they helped at the Dance Festival. “We had to escort schools to and from the stage and set up seating arrangements. We arrived at the Forum at about 2.00pm and started to put together the holding areas. Each school had a specific area in which they would change and prepare.


In addition, they all had a place where they could watch the show before they went on stage. As leaders, we were based in different rooms to help move the schools along, the majority of us were based in the Upper Circle. Two of us were based in the foyer to take schools back to the upper circle following their performance. This job required a lot of running around and was very stressful. But we managed to escort all the schools quickly and efficiently, which made it a very enjoyable experience.”


Written by Emily Symonds, Robyn Butler and Sarah Paul


Everyone enjoyed their time spent at the Forum and we hope to see everyone back next year where there will be a new exciting theme.


Matilda Evans and Megan Munro


Kingdown Dance Ambassadors


Horningsham Primary School 14 Wiltshire and Swindon Relay


Photos by Harry Calvert


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