Match of the Day visits Albion in the Community
Albion in the Community (AITC) was recently visited by the BBC’s Match of the Day programme to film a feature on the charity’s important work supporting local schools in Sussex.
The filming took place at Breakwater Academy in Newhaven, where AITC has been working for four years to support the school’s curriculum with football-themed PHSE, maths, literacy, and PE activities. The charity has a member of staff based at the school one day per week working with three groups of ten pupils to help them in their learning and life skills.
Throughout the pandemic, AITC have continued to help pupils at Breakwater including class-based support for vulnerable and key worker children and through a virtual transition programme over the summer to support children who were moving up into secondary school.
More recently, Breakwater Academy was a recipient of some of the 100 laptops donated to local schools from the Albion as One Fund, helping pupils without access to technology get online and continue home learning.
The BBC filmed the AITC team using football to inspire children in their maths through an activity based on fantasy football and building a team with a defined budget.
AITC’s player ambassador Adam Lallana was a special surprise visitor for the children, joining them online to answer their questions about his career, training routine and favourite goal.
Headteacher Zoe Griffiths explained on the film: “We have this amazing Premier League football team just up the road and they come to us and that makes a massive difference. It adds to what we do as our core purpose of giving the children a really solid education.”
Watch the full video here: BBC Match of the Day visited Albion in the Community
The value of the club’s involvement was also shared by Frazer Simpkins, AITC’s curriculum development officer: “When you come in wearing the Albion badge straight away it breaks down the barriers for the children. When we are doing football-themed maths activity it engages them in a different way and gets them learning, gets them thinking and communicating with each other and builds teamwork and resilience.”
The charity works across 140 primary and secondary schools in Sussex providing a wide range of workshops, after school clubs, physical education, and curriculum support. If you would like your school to be involved in AITC’s schools’ programme email: schools@bhafcfoundation.org.uk