smiles wrote:Davie, I don't think it is the comunity that needs convincing with regards the need. The one big problem we have always encountered is the lack of sport interest from people employed in the Council in Campbeltown. There is no interest what so ever in local sports. The same can be said about our local councillors. Then you have the local schools and PE where there is no interest in football at all. Bring back Sandy MacPherson anyday.
We regularly have representation from our local councillors at our monthly South Kintyre Sports Council meetings held in Aqualibrium. I am sure this doesn't happen in all areas of Scotland.
The teaching of physical education in schools has moved on from the days when it was all about football.
Football is and will remain a very important activity taught in PE, in fact this year in the secondary school football was a performance component within Higher PE and a number of students (both male and female) gained A passes in this activity. Football was a popular activity at Inter-House Competition after school and volunteer coaches train school football teams outside school hours, two school teams have competed in competition against other schools within recent weeks. (playing on poor grass pitches!)
Rugby was successfully introduced this year and has proved very popular. With the assistance of our excellent SRU Rugby Development Officer, Billy Thomson and our new janitor we now have a school team and already have had students play in Argyll Schools Select teams against other regions.
When the school estate decision is made and we get sports facilities on a par with other similar sized schools I believe this will make a huge difference to the opportunities available to our young (and not so young) people in this area.
My view is that the community should not rely on the school estate as this will prioritise the needs of the school first and foremost and this may well not be what the community needs.
A community project with the needs for the main user groups of such a facility may well be what is needed, however this is not a fundraising project for a new mini bus! ££££