The hugely successful Premier Skills initiative run by the Premier League and the British Council returns to Egypt next week. A new Premier Skills workshop will take place from 3-8 February 2013 at Movenpick Hotel, Media City; with intensive training for 30 grassroots football coaches from across Cairo, Alexandria, Minya, Aswan, Luxor, Assiut and Qena governorates. The workshop will be led by head coach Jeremy Weeks, who was recently Paralympic Football Competition Manager at the London 2012 Paralympic Games. He will be supported by Andy Martino and Jack Day, community coaches from Southampton and Stoke City respectively. All of the coaches involved in Premier Skills are UEFA qualified coaches.
Jointly organised by the British Council, Premier League and Ministry of State of Sports, Premier Skills launched its first phase in Egypt 2007. In its second phase, which began in 2010, small grants were presented to 41 coaches from Ard El Lewa, Omranya, Al Haram, Al Wara’a, Helwan, Mansheyet Nasser, Azarita, and Amereya to initiate and develop community projects through football.
“At home the Premier League and our Clubs have a long-held commitment and reputation for delivering high quality community and education programmes. Given our popularity and success internationally we felt it only right to take this approach to a wider community,” said Premier League Chief Executive, Richard Scudamore.
“Premier Skills has already taken place in 20 countries, developing over 1,100 new coaches all over the world under the current phase alone. These coaches have already delivered work that has benefited a further 400,000 young people. This second stage of the project, which launches in Egypt this week, will build on these achievements, further developing the skills of some of the most promising coaches that we have worked with.”
Premier Skills combines the reach of the British Council with the global appeal of the Premier League to use football to develop a brighter future for young people around the world. Drawing upon the Premier Leagues’ domestic expertise, it uses football to tackle a variety of social issues in the community, such as health, disability, gender, inclusion and education.
In addition to coaching, a range of materials, including a dedicated website, have been created for teachers and learners of English that utilise football-based content and the British Council’s world-class expertise in English.
“Our purpose is to connect people in the UK to people in other countries and football is a great way to do that,” said British Council Chief Executive, Martin Davidson. “We are therefore proud of Premier Skills, our partnership with the Premier League, and I am delighted that the second phase of this unique project, which combines English and football – two truly universal languages – is being launched in Egypt. This second stage of training will build upon the excellent work already done in Egypt giving the coaches further skills to use in their communities to develop community action projects."
Premier Skills has already delivered tremendous impact in 20 countries across Asia, Africa and the Americas. Since 2007 Premier Skills has created training opportunities benefitting 2,300 grassroots coaches and referees who in turn have reached more than 400,000 young people.
Under the programme 6,000 teachers have received face to face training in the use of the Premier Skills English materials, applying these in the classroom to reach thousands of pupils. In addition there have been 3.5 million views of the English materials online.