Change A Child's Life

The United Through Sport 2023 Annual Report is now available and it makes for really encouraging reading. The organisation demonstrated a real bounce back in program support and numbers reached with programming since the challenges of Covid. This level of support is deeply required as we are finding lasting impacts from the Covid-19 lockdown in the development (or lack there-of), in many of our beneficiaries and so now more than ever our programs are massively important.

In 2023 we reached 2838 children with our Early Inspiration Program – providing and introduction to physical education to help boost the physical and mental health and cognitive function of our early years participants aged 5 to 9 years old. As part of this we worked with 809 of these participants with literacy support to help those struggling the most learn to read and write to help set them up for future success and drastically increase their chance of remaining in formal education.

We worked with 8807 children in our Keep Active Program, delivering continued sports coaching and physical education along with key life skills and critical issues education to help our participants to develop the skills needed to navigate the challenging circumstances they grow up in. We saw a 90% improvement in participants mental health, 87% improvement in physical health and 86% improvement in knowledge of critical issues like sexual health, gender, alternatives to violence and substance abuse.

We also worked with 115 adolescent participants in our Girls and Boys Unite program where we work with each demographic separately to help them develop confidence, leadership and key skills in a safe, secure environment surrounded by positive adult role models. In this programme we identified improvements in confidence, resilience and leadership in 100% of participants, which is hugely encouraging for their future success.

93 participants aged 14 to 19 continued on our Pathway to Success in our Future Generations program supported with full bursaries to top level high schools where they receive excellent levels of academic education and sports coaching, drastically increasing their chances of progressing on to higher education.

Finally in our Youth Rising Program we continued to support 236 participants between the age of 18 and 35 to increase their chances of employability by supporting them with higher education, practical job skills training and internships and entrepreneurial support. This program continues to flourish with 86% of participants gaining employment after completing the program.

“We’d like to say a massive thank you to all our supporters and donors who have helped us over the past 12 months. The communities where we work have really been ravaged by the impact of Covid. However with the kindness of so many generous supporters we feel we were able to provide a really important service to so many and do our part to help our beneficiaries come through this challenging time”. – Qondakele Sompondo – CEO, United Through Sport

• Annual Report (PDF)