This week we witnessed the culmination of close to years work dedicated to promoting and developing the women's game culminating in an extremely well attended All Girls tournament at Leeds Beckett University.
Operating under the "Her Legacy" title, the new overarching brand for COLBF's All-Girls activities, we had four schools vying for a city title, a first for the city of Leeds and an exciting step forward for Girls basketball in Leeds. The schools competing in this final round of the 2003-2004 academic calendar were Allerton High school, Allerton Grange High School, Ruth Gorse Academy and Dixons Trinity Academy all of which were beneficiaries of the COLBF Together Fund Bid. With our Women's and Girls Development Officer Katie Lamond leading the way, over 60 young women from years 7-10 were completely immersed and engaged in healthy competition with wholesale development remit. The objective was to open doors into the game of basketball via positive experiences, and although inevitable there would be wins and losses, the feedback from the floor was positive with many young women asking what would be next. This highlights our responsibility to make sure we provide the appropriate opportunities moving forward.
COLBC Director Matt Newby was proud of this particular event in the calendar:
"A strong programme of sports development is emerging here and this event is the signing off on a gateway piece for the city. Over the last 9 months we have been active in 5 High Schools, taking the sport to the young women of the Leeds and the engagement from the PE departments of the respective schools has been great. Furthermore, the opportunity to deliver both curricular and extracurricular activity in a phased approach has allowed us to promote the sport and engage more participants. The 'Her Legacy' title is vindicated by engagement of both the participants and the women from our broader programme who have contributed to the delivery of this project. Whether that's directing the initiative, coaching or engaging as volunteers and officials .
COLBC Women's & Girls Development Officer Katie Lamond was proud to see the culmination of a strong year's work with young women across Leeds:
"Another occasion to be proud of here at COLBC. The aim of the Her Legacy tournament is to create a competitive environment for girls to apply and develop their team and individual basketball skills. For them to begin to build and develop a strong basketball foundation through gameplay. The hope is that this event will be something that will impact women and girls for years to come. Our first ever Her Legacy tournament facilitated not only tough competition and gameplay, but further demonstrated other important roles in basketball such as coaching and officiating. Once again highlighting the different avenues and outlets women and girls can go and obtain when provided the chance to do so. It was a pleasure to see so many girls truly making the most of the moment. All the teams involved were phenomenal and we saw a brilliant mix of competition and camaraderie across the afternoon."
Comments