Happy New Year! Welcome to the Parkour UK Monthly Update December 2022.
This month’s monthly update will look a little different. It will be full of all the updates that happened during December, but will also highlight all the work the Parkour UK team has done throughout 2022!
First of all, the updates!
In the closing weeks of the year, we announced an entire year’s worth of dates for 2023 for both the Level 1 and Level 2 courses, for the first time.
For those looking for more information on the Level 2 coaching qualification, follow this link here for the full information, or take a look at this graphic below, designed by our digital team.
The Level One course bookings are now live on our website. Our Level 2 coaching course bookings will be live on the site very soon.
We will be announcing the Level 2 booking on our website and social media, so keep an eye on those for any updates.
At the start of December, we ran our second MHFA course, this time at Aspire Parkour Academy in Peterborough.
The Aspire Parkour Team was also joined by Parkour UK Tutor Dan Timms and Parkour UK Tutor and Elected Director for England, Chris Keighley.
At the start of December, the Parkour UK team travelled to Leeds for the UK Coaching Awards.
Parkour UK nominated a number of parkour coaches for the 25th Annual UK Coaching Awards, with three of our nominations being selected as finalists.
In its 25-year history, this was the first time Parkour coaches were nominated and become shortlisted as finalists;
Sam Coppack – “The Parkour Coach Companion,” was nominated for the “Podcast of the Year” Award – Parkour Coach Companion continues to keep people connected with regular interviews and engaging episodes, bringing together international voices of parkour and curating coaching knowledge from the community.
Adam Romaine – Change a Life Award – Adam has had a profound impact on a young person named Matthew, who has Down syndrome and other complex needs. He has helped Matthew overcome significant barriers to taking part in parkour, having previously tried many other sports.
Callum Windsor – Young Coach of the Year Award – In multiple ways, Callum goes above and beyond with his sessions. His session planning extends to 3D modelling of floor plans with a detailed analysis of the optimum use of equipment. He then cascades this knowledge down to the assistant coaches and volunteers, ensuring participants enter an environment that feels structured, safe, and directed.
Although none were chosen as winners, their selection as finalists demonstrates the impact they are having and the importance of sports like parkour.
We loved the celebration of coaches and coaching, from the grassroots and the elite all the way to the volunteer/paid and new/lifelong coaches.
Congratulations to all the winners and finalists, all of whom demonstrate the impact of sport on people’s lives.
The evening was also an opportunity to enhance the relationships that we are building with other system partners to support the Sport England strategy #UnitingTheMovement.
We were joined by other members at Parkour UK, our chair Dr Tracy Rea, and Elected Director Chris Keighley. They entertained some leaders from the sector, with whom we are building strategic partnerships.
We were also joined by;
Hayley Lever from GreaterSport, which are an active partnership for Greater Manchester. They lead, support, and connect the Greater Manchester system to create conditions to enable Active Lives for All by uniting communities and creating more equal and inclusive places so people can lead happier, healthier, and more fulfilled lives.
James Hope-Gill from Skateboard GB, the official governing body for skateboarding in the UK, a membership-based and not-for-profit organisation set up to improve, support, and develop skateboarding. They aim to encourage the development of world-class facilities, help community groups get local skate parks built, create accredited coaching courses, and run competitions.
Clare Freer from UK Coaching, supports the development of coaches and coaching, with the main focus on equality and inclusive practice. They do this directly with coaches through workshops, e-learning, virtual classrooms, and communities of learning.
We were also joined by Greg Clements from Sport England, who met and heard the stories of the parkour finalists and listened to the progress that we are making through our system and the governing roles that are supporting the national strategy.
On the Wednesday and Thursday following the UK Coaching Awards, the team spent some time together at the UK Coaching offices in the center of Leeds.
It was the second time that Callun Lavington, Lynn Jung, Kieran Wylde, Simon Vardy, Chris Grant, and Dan Newton have come together as a team, and highlighted all of the key work they have done since our last all-hands meeting in September. It was also really valuable to enhance relationships and understand each other’s work.
Mark Gannon, UK Coaching’s CEO, spent some time with us, speaking passionately about their work and the progress they have made in the last few years.
This year, we have been working with Lizzie Campbell, who has helped us with the review of our Level 2 coaching course, and we look forward to extending our work with UK Coaching in 2023.
We hosted our Annual General Meeting on Tuesday, November 29th. During December, the recording and minutes from the 2022 Annual General Meeting were made available. You can watch that below.
With the updates from the month of December listed above, we wanted to take the time to reflect on everything that Parkour UK achieved in 2022.
Throughout 2022, Parkour UK has been a strong force within the UK Parkour community, and we are grateful for the support and enthusiasm we have seen from the parkour community.
We have had a number of highlights this year, and we have mapped those out below.
We received £1.5 million from Sport England. This funding is to help support and grow parkour participation and use the sport to tackle inequalities in England over the next 5 years. Following this, our Head of Development, Chris Grant went onto the Motus Podcast, one of the leading podcasts in our sport, to discuss how Parkour UK will spend the funding from Sport England.
We expanded our team. Kieran Wylde handed over his previous role as Workforce Lead to Simon Vardy. Kieran now works as our Membership Lead for Parkour UK. We also welcomed Callun Lavington and Lynn Jung in digital support roles and held a second wave of recruitment, which will be announced soon.
During 2022, Parkour UK team members also attended numerous Parkour events, including Project Underground, Storror Big Wall Open, and the Sheffield Takeover Event.
We highlighted members of our organisation and community on Instagram with our “Weekly Clips” series.
Also on Instagram, we started our “Week in Review,” series, delivered by Chris Grant. This series gives the community the chance to engage and ask questions regarding the work that Parkour UK is doing, and is a really useful tool to keep the community engaged with the work the organisation is doing.
This year, we enhanced the learning options that are available to the parkour community. We held two Mental Health First Aid courses to provide the parkour community with the tools they need in the event of a mental health crisis.
We spent a lot of time redeveloping our Level 2 coaching qualification, and for the first time, announced full-year Level 1 and Level 2 course schedules for 2023.
And, as mentioned above, we nominated Parkour coaches for the UK Coaching Awards for the first time in its 25-year history, and 3 coaches were shortlisted as finalists
And there was so much more, those highlights only scratch the surface of what Parkour UK achieved last year.
2022 was a brilliant opportunity to serve, elevate, and add value to the broad spectrum of the Parkour community, and we cannot wait to continue this momentum of growth in 2023.
