Tackling poverty and social exclusion

2. Vi-Ability is a national award
winning social enterprise that
was set up in December 2009,
by ex-Arsenal, Liverpool and
Welsh international footballer
Kelly Davies.
Whose vision is:
“For every community to have a
thriving and financially stable
sports club at its heart, providing
opportunities for people to
develop employability & life skills
to broaden their horizons”

3. o Problem #1: Rising number of football / sport clubs currently in or
threatened by
administration
Need: (a) Professionalisation of non-playing side
(b) Generation of income
(c) Greater interaction with the local community (fan base)
o Problem # 2: Challenging numbers of young people not in education,
employment or training
Need: (a) More encouragement, support and guidance
(b) A learning programme that meets young people’s needs & aspirations
- reflects interests & aptitudes
- offers the opportunity to gain qualifications, work experience &
employment
- takes place in a more relaxed & inspirational environment
- incorporates positive leisure activities
Financially unstable sports clubs and youth disengagement
are big problems in society that need to be addressed...

4. Vi-Ability teaches participants how to design, plan and run activities that will help
them to gain recognised qualifications; develop confidence, self-esteem; and
new transferable employability skills that will enable them to progress into further
learning or jobs, and become economically active in the future.
Participants learn how to perform a role (practically) and use
business/community development examples to help them gain skills so
that they can take ownership of initiatives to help a club generate income,
and have a positive impact on their local community through social action
A unique work based learning programme, that
introduces young people to the commercial
management of a sports club

5. Theory of change for core 8-week programme

6. Funding Streams
• Awarded contract through the Engagement Gateway, WCVA ESF funded
programme, we truly believe that without this we would not be where we are
today
• Participants from the EG funded courses were offered the opportunity to go on
an EU work placement through a Leonardo mobility grant (now Erasmus+)
• 2 week work placement in Italy, Spain, Portugal, Poland or Sweden
• Putting theory into practice
• Progression route onto FJF/JGW and ILM for top participants, other WCVA
ESF and Welsh Government Schemes
• O2 Think Big and other smaller funders, participants take ownership and apply
for funding to run their own project
• We have a 96% retention rate and 82% of participants progress onto
employment within 1 month of leaving the programme, and sustain
employment for more than 13 weeks.

8. • Interreg – Ireland Wales and Erasmus+
• Lottery – People and places for clubs directly
• NESTA – Innovative social action fund expanding Vi-Ability into
London
• Sport Wales and NGB funding – Work underway with 6 North Wales
clubs, now focussed on 6 South Wales Clubs
• As well as benefiting from the funding bought in for the participants
and their training
Club funding…

9. KEY PARTNERS ….

10. Lessons Learnt…
• Clear accounting is key to ensure you don’t match EU funds with with
other EU funds
• Funding for Erasmus+ is much less per participant than Leonardo
• Erasmus+ is only paid when 100% of participants have submitted
evaluation reports returns
• Interreg funding is 100% audit each claim
• Processes are long and time consuming throughout
• Ensure you put in enough admin and management time or the project will
cost you!!
Benefits…
• Flexibility in project design
• Support readily available
• Enables the weaving of funds to create strong projects which are not
single source reliant

11. Our Social Impact…
In the last twelve months in Wales alone, we have:
CHANGED THE LIVES
OF 380 YOUNG
INDIVIDUALS
CREATED
OPPORTUNITIES
THAT HAVE BOUGHT
COMMUNITIES
TOGETHER
TRANSFORMED 12
COMMUNITY SPORT
CLUBS
82% OF ALL
PARTICIPANTS HAVE
GONE ON TO
SECURE
EMPLOYMENT
96% COMPLETED
THEIR COURSE AND
GAINED AT LEAST 2
QUALIFICATIONS
SPORT CLUBS WE
HAVE WORKED WITH
HAVE BENEFITED
FROM INCREASED
REVENUE