PREMIER LEAGUE INSPIRES PARTICIPANTS WORK TO TACKLE GENDER INEQUALITY
22 April 2025On 28th February, 65 Year 9 students from eight secondary schools attended an event at the Eco-Power Stadium hosted by Club Doncaster Foundation.
The students were participants in last term’s Premier League Inspires programme delivered by the Foundation and the centrepiece of the event was an afternoon of small group presentations by students to pitch their different ideas for social action projects to tackle gender inequality in wider society.
From January to March, one of the key focuses of the Foundation’s Premier League Inspires delivery in schools was to work with targeted students to build confidence and self-esteem as well as developing employability skills and promoting positive mental wellbeing, by engaging participants in a wider social action initiative called the Premier League Inspires Challenge.
Delivered by the charitable arms of 45 professional football clubs, each year the Premier League Inspires Challenge supports young people across England and Wales to learn more about the wider issues we face as a society before empowering them to come up with their own ideas to overcome these issues.
The theme of this year’s Premier League Inspires Challenge was gender equality. After exploring a range of relevant themes linked to gender equality in sessions, participants were divided into teams of three to five and tasked with creating their own social action projects to tackle gender inequality and ensure everyone can benefit from the same opportunities no matter their gender.
To support participants with this task, Foundation staff delivered dedicated sessions to develop problem solving and teamwork skills as well as building understanding of communication and presentation skills.
After seven sessions of social action planning and life skills development, participants arrived at the Eco-Power Stadium to present their social action project ideas in front of participants and staff from other schools as well as a panel of six judges. The panel was made up of the CEO of the Foundation, three of the Foundation’s trustees and two Doncaster Rovers Belles LFC Reserves players.
The presentations showcased a range of creative ideas from students to tackle gender inequality including delivering educational workshops to engage more people in conversations about gender equality, creating and promoting videos, websites and social media campaigns to raise public awareness of issues linked to gender equality and hosting sporting events to fundraise for organisations already working to tackle gender inequality.
Out of a strong field, the judges selected the presentation of three students from Hall Cross Academy as the most impressive social action pitch delivered on the day. These students’ social action project idea focused on identifying sports and activities with gender gaps in participation levels before working with local primary schools to deliver targeted taster sessions in these sports and activities for students belonging to underrepresented genders.
The three students from Hall Cross Academy will continue to work with Foundation staff next term to bring their social action project to life and create real change to promote greater gender equality. They will also travel to Wembley Stadium on 23rd April to represent Doncaster Rovers in the national stage of this season’s Premier League Inspires Challenge.
If you would like to learn more about our Premier League Inspires programme and how it could support students in your school then please get in touch by emailing ed.omahony@clubdoncasterfoundation.co.uk.
