Spotlight Interview- The Outdoor Partnership
We chat with SPW Partner Leila Connolly, Outdoor Activity Development Officer for Central South Wales at The Outdoor Partnership
Tell us about your organisation?
Formed in 2004 The Outdoor Partnership aimed to address a disconnect in north west Wales where there were limited opportunities for local people to take part in outdoor activities.
Since then, we have worked on numerous programmes and projects that aim to overcome the barriers that exist to local people accessing local outdoor activity provision.
Now, The Outdoor Partnership work to support people across all of Wales and other regions in the UK, to take up outdoor activities as a life-long pursuit.
Our vision means ENHANCING people’s physical & mental health and wellbeing, economic return (including employment), the social value through OUTDOOR ACTIVITY such as grassroots participation in activities such as Walking, Cycling, Adventure Sports (including climbing, canoeing, paddleboarding, sailing, mountain biking, etc)
Tell us about the projects and support that you offer to people in Wales?
The Outdoor Partnership provides opportunities for local residents from all walks of life, in all our operating regions, to become involved with the Outdoors through our core programmes.
Our Community Development Programme is led by our Outdoor Activity Development Officers and inspires thousands of children, young people and adults each year to take up outdoor activities as a life-long pursuit through delivering taster sessions, development programmes, festivals and events, and progression to sustained provision, further skills development, training, volunteering and employment. Our Community Cohesion programme supports communities at a local level according to their identified needs, to empower and upskill them to provide sustainable access for everyone to high quality, suitable, regular, safely run outdoor activities.
The Pathways to Employment programme uses outdoor activities to help young NEET people (Not in Education, Employment or Training) and long-term unemployed people back onto a pathway to further learning, training, volunteering, and employment. Pathways to Employment also includes various programmes in specific regions that aim to increase the number of people who are applying for trainee positions at outdoor centres and outdoor businesses in that area
The Health and Wellbeing programme brings together a collaboration of partners from the outdoor and health sectors to increase physical activity levels, improve mental and physical health and provide links with local community clubs and groups enabling people to lead independent long term active lifestyles.
This project is building on the growing field of research prescribing people activities for their health rather than medication and is known as social prescribing.
What does the next 12 months look like for your organisation?
Well this looks different in each region. Since I am focussing on Central South Wales I can only really speak for my region, albeit we have organisational objectives that we work towards. But mostly I am working hard at building relationships and have started new inclusive activities with group such as Deaf and hard of hearing doing multiple paddlesport and climbing sessions, due to do the same with Visually impaired youth. These will feed into our Inclusive Climbing Club in Boulders, Cardiff. I shall continue to work with Adventure Therapy funding and grow the Adventure Learning Framework trial with local schools across Cardiff. Lastly we shall continue to work with young carers and their families with the AMSER funding.
Where can people find you online?
Y Bartneriaeth Awyr Agored | The Outdoor Partnership
Ffon | Tel: 07872 851 395
Social Media Links: https://linktr.ee/top_central_south_wales