The Diamonds Study Centre held its Presentation Evening on Monday 19th July to celebrate the end of the Summer Term of “Playing for Success” sessions at the centre. The sessions have been run in the evenings, at the Study Centre based at Rushden and Diamonds Football Club, as part of a national government initiative which aims to improve the student’s standards in Numeracy, Literacy and Information Technology as well as to boost their confidence and self-esteem through the medium of “sports related” activities. The scheme involves a partnership between the Department for Children, Schools and Families, Northamptonshire County Council and the football club and is geared towards Year 5 and Year 8 students. There are currently 163 centres, representing nineteen different sports, based at professional sports clubs across the country.

The Presentation Evening for the Diamonds Study Centre was held in the Kimberley  Suite at Rushden and Diamonds Football Club.  Relatives and teachers watched the youngsters, aged between 9 and 14 years, being presented with their certificates by Rushden & Diamonds Academy Players James, Jordan and Max.

The schools involved in the scheme this term have all come from the Kettering area namely from The Kettering Buccleuch Academy (Yr5 and Yr8)  in addition to the students from Oakway, Greenfields, Grange, and St Mary’s Primary Schools.

Study Centre Manager Rob Jones said, “The Presentation Evening was a nice occasion for all concerned and it was pleasing to hear some of the young people talking to their teachers and families about their achievements during the course of the term. The youngsters have been a credit to their families and their schools and the tremendous turnout reflected the high regard shown for the Playing for Success initiative. I would also like to take this opportunity to thank all of the teachers and parents for their assistance this term and to commend Rushden and Diamonds Football Club for its involvement with the local community and the continuing support which it has given to the Study Centre during this academic term.”  

It has been another action packed week at the Study Centre this week with our  primary and secondary schools from the Kettering area continuing with the Playing for Success programme. 

Students were set a challenge to produce their dream sports team with a budget of £50 million,  complete with a stadium design, a sponsor, a manager and a mascot.  They also put their art skills to the test by producing creative designs for their sports kit on their origami football shirts.  Pupils learnt many new skills on the computer such as using search engines to find images of the players for their teams and year 8 pupils designed club badges incorporating the theme for their sports team using the computer.

 Next week:  Continue with the Club Challenge.

This week our young learners became budding young journalists interviewing players from Rushden and Diamonds to find out what it is like to be a professional footballer and how this fits in with their life outside of football.

We saw mixed emotions from the students this week as they displayed a combination of excitement and nervousness at interviewing prospective future stars in Callum Earls, Liam Read, George Artemi, James Broadbent and Morgan Phillips from the Rushden and Diamonds Academy. 

All the students showed great maturity when asking the players questions about themselves and the opportunity of talking to the footballers had clearly motivated the students to complete their follow up work of producing a write up of the interviews.  The interview activity and the follow up work proved to be an extremely worthwhile exercise in the improvement of their speaking, listening and writing skills in a very enjoyable way.

To view one of the interview write please click on the link below

Player Interviews

This week saw the start of the Summer term for the Playing for Success programme at Diamonds Study Centre.  4 Primary and 1 Secondary school from the Kettering area are taking part this term in this exciting 10 week programme. 

Young learners had a tour of the Sports Centre this week as well as using the ICT equipment to make name badges.  They then learnt the art of origami by making football shirts out of folded paper.  The young learners also started their Diamonds Diaries to record their experiences of their time here.

Lots of fun was had by all and we look forward to continuing with the groups next week.

Next week: Young learners will interview players from RDFC.