Recently, The FA National Youth Council were fortunate enough to hold our second in person team meeting at the most fantastic venue and home to none other than the England National Team, St Georges Park!
My name is Oli and earlier in the season I was given the pleasure of representing the FA National Youth Council as the Community Engagement Lead for the North. This role ensures there is a support system for all 12 County FA’s in the region. The rest of the team consist of many different roles right from Research, EDI, Learning & Development, Social media and Marketing and Communications all the way through to the rest of the community engagement team which covers the remaining 3 regions and clubs and leagues!
It is not very often that the whole team of 15 members can get together and discuss our experiences and how our roles are going. However, when we do get the opportunity for this to happen and to have some of the most influential young people all in one room, it can be quite inspiring. Even more so when you are the youngest in the room like myself! It is such a positive environment and can lead to so many learning opportunities. Some of these learning opportunities consisted of having a deeper look into the fantastic resources such as the FA Youth Leadership Volunteering Toolkit and the compass workbooks (YLVT), this allowed us as a team to gain a deeper understanding of how important these resources are and how beneficial these can be when shared with County FA’s and their Youth Councils.
Another benefit of coming together is being able to learn about each other’s roles and what progress people have made in making a difference to the great game! It was also a great opportunity for us to focus on the FA National Youth Council vision and why we are in the roles we are.
It also wouldn’t be a team meeting around the festive period without some festive fun! Secret Santa's and many festive games were played in our down time to help us regain some energy after the work we had put in.
Suddenly, the last day was upon us, and it was almost time to leave St Georges Park. However, we weren’t quite done there we had an amazing Equality Diversity and Inclusion workshop delivered to us by one of the members of our team, our EDI Lead Anoushka. This allowed us to look at the importance of EDI and what it means to our community. After the workshop, we had an introduction to FA Leadership Academy (FALA), its purpose, what it looks like and what impact we can have on how this is shaped! Following this, we were given some collaborative working time which allowed us to break off into some smaller groups and have some insightful discussions about our next steps in our smaller branched off teams and how we can continue to create a lasting legacy.
Lastly it was time to say goodbye to the team and for me to have a lovely long drive all the way back up north to sunny Newcastle!
Final thing from me, I promise! A few actions for you to consider:
- Keep your eye out for the FALA application forms coming out in the Spring
- Get in touch with your local County FA if you want to find out about volunteering opportunities or how to join your local Youth Council
- Use the resources previously mentioned the FA YLVT and Compass workbooks.
Thank you for reading and if you would like any support and have any questions, please do not hesitate to contact the FA National Youth Council via email.
- nationalyouthcouncil@thefa.com