Who are we?
Our Club is a voluntary amateur soccer club based in Augher, County Tyrone. Reformed in 2016, the Club has 100+ members and currently caters for youth football and 2 senior teams, playing in the Fermanagh and Western league. Our Club enables sports and physical activity by providing regular football and physical activity opportunities for those living within the isolated rural community of Augher and the surrounding Slieve Divena area through coaching sessions as well as competitive matches throughout the year.
Our Club has grown really well in recent years and we are also now running u11, 12, 13, 14, 15 boys and u14 girls teams and girls u16s because of our hard work promoting girls football. We also delivered a successful Crowdfunder for our girls teams last year.
The aims and objectives of our Club are:
- To offer coaching and competitive opportunities in football
- To promote the club and sport within the local community
- To ensure a duty of care to all members of the Club
- To provide our programmes and services in a way that is inclusive and fair for all.
Our Club strives to provide opportunities that improve opportunities in sport for better physical, mental and emotional wellbeing.
The Club works hard to develop local community links, for example our volunteers focus much of our efforts with local community groups and organisations to ensure everyone has access to sport and wellbeing activities. A major aim of the Club moving forward is to encourage more participation from parents, local families and supporters
Why are we crowdfunding?
We are excited to launch our new introduction to football programme for our rural community here in Augher and Clogher. Our programme is a new programme, designed to offer fun and active winter activities for rural isolated young people and older people in our community in particular.
We will run 16 weeks, 4 hours per week for youths and older people in Augher and Clogher to come to our facilities and take part in activities such as light exercise, walking football, new youth football beginner sessions (for new young people who never played football before), tiny tots sessions and programmes such as yoga, stretching, pilates and community health and fitness talks.
We will reach over 50 new people through this project, who are living in a rural community.
To make this happen, we need your support through our crowdfunding. Our rural community faces unique challenges, and we want to ensure everyone has access to these fantastic sporting opportunities.
Our new sports programme in Augher is specifically designed to create opportunities for those in our community who have traditionally been excluded from participating in sports and engaging actively within our club- Young people and older rural isolated persons. We recognise this demographic often face barriers to physical activity and social engagement. These barriers include physical limitations, lack of accessible facilities, and social isolation.
Our project directly addresses these challenges by providing a tailored, inclusive programme that is new and additional to our normal club activities.
We are making our programme as accessible as possible by offering activities at our local facilities in Augher, which are easily reachable for most community members.
The programme is designed to be inclusive, not just in terms of physical activity but also in fostering social connections. We are offering activities that emphasise social interaction. This helps reduce the isolation that many face in rural areas, contributing to improved mental health and well-being.
We are not only encouraging participation but also enabling parents and older people to take on active roles within the club. As part of the programme, we will be introducing a volunteer development initiative, where participants who wish to contribute more can receive training to become volunteer coordinators or committee roles. This will empower them to play an active role in the delivery of the programme, fostering a sense of ownership and community leadership.
This project represents a significant expansion of our club's activities, reaching out to a new target group that has not been the focus of our previous efforts. By specifically designing the programme, we are bringing a new demographic into our club, diversifying our membership, and enriching the community's engagement with sports.
Through this project, we are leveling the playing field by actively addressing the needs of those who have been traditionally excluded from sports and club activities. By focusing on our wider rural community, reducing participation barriers, and fostering inclusive leadership opportunities, we are creating a new, vibrant initiative that will have a lasting impact on our community.
This project is a significant step forward in making sports accessible to everyone, regardless of age, ability, or previous experience, and aligns with our commitment to inclusivity and community well-being.
How we’ll spend the money raised
Your contributions will help us cover the costs of equipment, coaches, refreshments, promoting the programme and so on. More specifically, our budget is as follows:
Coaching Costs over 16 weeks, 4 hours per week @ £30 per hour x 3 coaches= £5,760 (to include striker coaches and goalkeeper coaching).
Project Specific Equipment and future coaching equipment= £2,000 (Multi Sport Coaching Packs x 10 @ £200 each. Balls bibs and cones @ £1,000 budget).
Outreach and Marketing= £500 (social media adds and print).
Refreshement budget= £740
Every little bit helps, and your support will have a huge impact on our rural community. Together, we can create a winter sports programme that brings joy and health benefits to our rural community in Augher.
Community impact
We are the only soccer club in our rural community for those wanting to play football in Augher, Clogher, Aughnacloy, and Ballygawley.
Because of this, our community impact is huge, and because we live in a rural community, we provide access to football facilities.
We also link with other local clubs such as the GAA Club and running club for shared initiatives throughout the year. This also has a huge positive impact on our rural community because of collaboration.
We are also promoting girls in sport. In 2023 we successfully delivered an important female football crowdfunded programme supported by Sport NI. This is was a major success and had lots of impact on our community for girls to access sport.
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. Fundraise for us. If you want to run your own fundraiser – 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!