Published
By CPC Helpdesk
Continuing our blossoming relationship with the transformative City in the Community charity, the charitable wing of Manchester City Football Club, CPC was a proud sponsor of a ten-school, 300-child boccia roadshow, this summer. 🌞
CalIing in at schools across Greater Manchester, the roadshow offered opportunities to try the sport of boccia, an inclusive sport played indoors using soft leather balls, described as game of skill, with intriguing tactics and even nail-biting tension.
Able to be contested in singles, doubles and trios matches, boccia's aim is to throw your red or blue ball (dependent on the initial coin toss) as close as possible to the white jack, drawing comparison with traditional games of bowls and/or pétanque.
Boccia is game particularly suited to players with high support needs, with its adaptable nature helping to make it one of the most inclusive sports of all, while also enabling its disabled and non-disabled participants to compete alongside one another.
Originally conceived to be played by people with cerebral palsy, boccia has evolved over the years to welcome other groups, encompassing inclusion in the Paralympic Games, as one of the few Paralympic sports without an Olympic Games equivalent.
Today, played socially, locally and internationally, boccia has been called the world's fastest growing disability sport and with more than 50 countries around the globe falling under the auspices of the Boccia International Sports Federation (or BISFed).
Since focusing its Giving Back programme on SEND, wellbeing and attendance initiatives, CPC has been able to support/fund a string of activity-based programmes, with our partnership with CITC allowing us to appropriately extend these efforts, bringing boccia to schools around our home region of Greater Manchester - helping facilitate an even more inclusive sporting summer.
City in the Community was founded in 1986 and aims to empower healthier lives for young people, both locally in Manchester and in cities around the world. Working for Healthy People, Healthy Futures and Healthy Communities, CITC's objectives align with CPC's Giving Back initiative and its wellbeing heartbeat, making our newly-forged partnership a marriage of mutual aims.
CPC had previously supported the the One City Deaf Festival, which took place at the City Football Academy in Manchester in June, with no fewer than 74 students participating in football activities in the club's indoor dome, a part of the Etihad Campus.
Watch the video on LinkedIn to see Disability Schools Officer, Lewis Hickie, explain how CPC support has helped, this year...