Alongside Job Centre Plus, Ayr United Football Academy have begun running a Support Employment programme. Set up with the vision of getting the young people in Ayrshire back into work, it also aims to help them with fitness, their own training and to achieve football coaching badges.
The Academy’s philosophy has always been that it is extremely important to support and help young people in the community and during this difficult time in the economy many of them have struggled to find work. In order to help tackle this, the Support Employment scheme has been put together. For two days each week (Wednesday and Friday) the participants are given a two hour training session in the morning. These sessions are aimed to help with CV building, job searching, employer visits and interview skills. They are then taking to Pro-Soccer in Ayr where they are put through their level 1 in football coaching.
Programme organiser Gregor Kyle said,
“The whole point of this scheme is to find these young people work or get them into full time education with college etc. I strongly believe that the participants taking part in this programme will be able to achieve this after the 12 weeks with the Academy. At the end they will have all shown a strong interest in finding work and we are finding that they are willing to take all the help the Academy can offer”.
AUFA coach Gregor Kyle worked alongside representatives from Job Centre Plus and interviewed many possible candidates from in and around Ayr. After some tough consideration they chose 13 participants who they thought were right for the 12 week run.
Gregor continued, “When interviewing we chose the people that we thought would benefit the most from the training that we provide and those who showed a keen interest in football”.
The programme will end on the 20th July with all the successful participants receiving a certificate from the Academy and a Level 1 coaching badge which they will be able to improve on if they choose to. This once again shows the great work that the Academy do for the community of Ayr and the surrounding area. Everyone that completes the programme will walk away will all the skills and knowledge needed to find work and the Academy wish them all luck for the future.
