NEWS Zooming in
BIGGA teams up with new online conference hosted by Carolinas superintendents’ association
GT under new ownership Industry trio completes Grounds Training acquisition
Grounds Training, the specialist training business dedicated to the sports turf and grounds maintenance sectors, is under new ownership having been acquired by three familiar industry names.
Having previously functioned under the Pitchcare/Maxwell Amenity and Agrovista brands, it became part of Sampson Training Limited in the summer, with partners Martin Sampson, Chrissie Johnson and Ellie Parry teaming up to take it forward.
This autumn, BIGGA will be partnering with the Carolinas Golf Course Superintendents Association in an online conference to satisfy members’ ongoing education needs during the coronavirus pandemic.
Known as Conference Comes to You, the programme will deliver 30 distinct seminars scheduled - one a day - over 30 weekdays starting 2 November 2020. There will be a one- week break for Thanksgiving in the US from 23 to 27 November.
Using a tailored Zoom platform, the two-hour seminars will be presented live each day at 1pm EST by some of the leading researchers, scientists and experts in their field. All seminars will carry GCSAA education points and BIGGA CPD credits.
As official partners with the Carolinas GCSA in this effort, BIGGA members will receive designated member pricing for every seminar using the promotional code UK2020. This will give a discount from $70 US to $40 US.
In addition to first-class education, members will also be able to share in $30,000 US worth of cash giveaways. A total of 82 prizes, ranging from £100 US to $2,500 US, will be drawn live on the Carolinas GCSA Facebook page at 1pm EST on 21 December. Each seminar taken qualifies you for one entry, so the more seminars taken, the more chances to win. Entries must be validated by watching a series of brief messages from industry partners.
The association benefits from your participation. A portion of each registration fee paid for by a BIGGA member will come back to BIGGA. So the more seminars you take, the more the association ‘wins'.
Registration and complete conference information will be available beginning on Friday 25 September via
www.ConferenceComestoYou.org
To date, more than three dozen chapters across the United States have become official Conference Comes to You partners.
Carolinas GCSA president, Brian Stiehler, CGCS, MG from Highlands Country Club in North Carolina said: “This platform benefits everyone involved and the more people who participate, the more benefit there will be for everyone. We see many visitors from across the country and overseas at our traditional conference and show each year. So, in these extraordinary times, when we can't be face to face, it made sense for our conference to go ‘see’ them.”
For more on BIGGA, you can visit
bigga.org.uk 4 PC October/November 2020 Martin Sampson Chrissie Johnson Ellie Parry
The trio will be no strangers to our readership. Former Grounds Manager Martin is an experienced instructor and assessor for Lantra, City & Guilds (NPTC) and UK Rural Skills, who has delivered training courses for Grounds Training since its inception. For the past six years he has run a land-based training consultancy from offices in Dorset and South Wales. He’s experienced increased demand for his services over the past few years and a growing need for high-quality training in the industry.
Chrissie joined Pitchcare in 2006 and founded Grounds Training later that year. Under her stewardship it went from strength to strength, developing a range of customised courses which became accredited by Lantra. She remained at the helm for 12 years until retiring in 2018. Ellie was part of the original team that launched Pitchcare and is one of the turf industry’s most prominent marketing communications professionals, working with a wide range of companies and organisations around the world through her agency, Forte.
As an Approved Training Provider with both
Lantra and UK Rural Skills, Sampson Training provides professional, on-site grounds maintenance and turf care training to groups of operatives. Its focus is on the delivery of training on-site at clients’ premises. Customers include sports clubs and associations, commercial organisations, schools, universities, local authorities, contractors and private estates. It also runs regular Safe Use and Safe Application of Pesticides courses (PA1/6) and a limited number of niche courses regionally, including lawn care, line marking and basic tree inspection.
Martin said; “As a training partner we offer clients a complete service, from initial enquiry to delivery and beyond, helping Grounds, Course and Estate Managers, HR staff in local authorities and companies of all sizes plan training and competence programmes for their staff teams. We work with a fantastic group of instructors and assessors with an incredibly diverse skillset, enabling us to deliver a broad range of training courses and qualifications.”
“Training others is incredibly rewarding. For the past few years I’ve been a tutor at a land-based college working with the next generation of turf professionals. It’s vital we address the skills shortage in our industry in order to ensure that the nation’s sports and leisure facilities, parks and green spaces have skilled people to maintain them, and that those personnel are able to work confidently, competently and safely.”
Tel: 01865 509 510
email
info@groundstraining.com visit
www.groundstraining.com
Premier League helps more that 1,000 clubs prepare their stadiums for football’s return
Football clubs across 65 leagues in England and Wales have received funding from the Premier League to prepare for the resumption of football, as well as the safe return of supporters to stadiums where permitted.
A total of 1,090 clubs from the National League System, Women’s Football Pyramid and Welsh Premier League have benefitted from grants through the Matchday Support Fund, which has distributed more than £5.5 million.
The money allows clubs to put measures in
place to make grounds safer for the 2020/21 season, given the risks posed by the COVID- 19 pandemic. The grants were managed by the Football Stadia Improvement Fund (FSIF), which is financed by the Premier League, and provides support for non-league and women’s clubs with the cost of improvements to their grounds.
Matchday Support Fund impact at a glance: • 1,090 grants worth £5,545,500
• 913 grants awarded to National League System clubs
• 165 grants awarded to clubs in the Women's Football Pyramid
• 12 grants awarded to Welsh Premier League clubs
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