Supporting Growth of Youth Hockey in Ballymoney

Aim

To grow our club volunteer base in order to recruit more girls through an outreach programme.

Who are we?

Ballymoney Ladies Hockey Club, formed in 1984 and based in the Joey Dunlop Centre, is a family friendly club with a vision to be a high quality club that is family and community orientated. We pride ourselves on catering for beginners, players with disabilities and elite players alike from ages 4+.

We currently have over 300 female members who currently compete in the following competitions: 3 adult female teams, a vets team and 5 youth teams playing in the Ulster Leagues.

We have seen success at an all-Ireland level, winning the Irish Senior Cup in 2001. We have represented Ireland in European Cup Winners Cup Division A in Spain 2002 and were Irish Senior Cup Runners up 2005 and 2008. We have produced 3 Ireland Captains, had 7 senior international caps and currently have 12 athletes on the TDP in Ulster. 

Community impact

This project will engage with U18 girls in the community who currently do not participate in sport / Hockey. We wish to run a new indoor Mums and Tots indoor  programme (Feb - May), and engage with local schools to promote our club (Feb - June) and grow the youth section. We are rolling 2 groups of Mums and Tots out and it will run for 8 weeks (16 sessions). At the same time (from Feb - June), we will upskill our 15-18 year olds and get more parents involved in the club, so we can take on more members.

Why are we crowdfunding?

We require funding for equipment, for upskilling volunteers via training and courses, and to help cover pitch hire and insurance costs for taking on more members. Since the pandemic, it has been harder to secure funding, and our club overheads have increased. This funding would help cover the rises in costs and enable us to run the programme.

How we’ll spend the money raised

We will spend the money on equipment, upskilling coaches, pitch hire, doing outreach programmes in local community groups / schools, running camps, running extra sessions and competitive opportunities for players.

How you can play your part

There are four simple ways to help us reach our target, and make this project a reality.

1. Make a pledge. Don’t delay if you’re going to support us because momentum is key to our success!

2. Spread the word. Share our project on your social media pages and tell the world to get behind us! The more people we reach, the more support we will get.

3. Offer rewards. Get involved if you are a local business by donating things we can offer to our supporters. We will give you a shout out!

4. If you want to run your own fundraiser to support us, maybe a sponsored activity or similar, use the 'contact project' button at the top of our page to let us know. Setting up your own page only takes a few minutes and you won’t need any bank details. Just a fun idea!

This project successfully funded on 29th March 2023