Jump-Start Scheme to Support Young People Launched

Careers in Sport are launching our ‘Jump-Start’ scheme with the aim of helping more young people gain employment in the sport and fitness industry. One in 13 Britons aged 16 to 24 are claiming the Universal Credit benefit, and Careers in Sport are appealing to professionals and organisations to give young people a ‘jump start’ in helping them gain employment in our sector.

The Coronavirus pandemic continues to challenge the way we live – and the way that we work. More than 750,000 people have been made redundant in the UK throughout lockdown, and more jobs are set to be lost with the furlough scheme ending in October. 

The last seven months have proved to be difficult for us all but one group, in particular, will face the biggest employment impact.

Young people aged between 16 to 24 are the worst hit by the crisis in the jobs market – and they will only continue to struggle as the furlough scheme draws to a close, redundancies increase, and the competition for jobs grows larger. 

Before the UK was put into lockdown in March, the number of under-25s claiming Universal Credit was 288,000. That number has now increased to 538,000 – meaning that one in 13 Britons aged between 16 to 24 claim the benefit. 

Competition to secure employment in the sports industry is as intense as the competition we witness between professional sportspeople on television. The gold medalist or goal scorer might well be front and centre in the public eye, but as we know an array of people help them into that position and yet more are helping to keep them there, both directly and indirectly.

Careers in Sport ‘Jump Start’ scheme aims to help young people find a non-competitive career path in sports, and not necessarily one that’s limited to coaching or teaching. If you work in sports business, coaching, media, science or health and fitness we would love you to support our scheme.

Call to Action!

Schemes like ‘Kickstart’ and ‘1000 Opportunities’ have been created to help reverse the worrying increase of young people claiming the benefit – and Careers in Sport want to play our part in helping young people during these unprecedented times! 

Since Careers in Sport launched in 2008, we have built the foundations of a sustainable platform for employers to post job opportunities in the sports industry. With over 60,000 social media followers and a website that has between 80,000 to 100,000 page views each month – we want you to use our platform to support young people access advice and opportunities in the sport and fitness industry.

We would like your support!

If you can offer any support for our scheme we would love to hear from you. You might be able to offer an hours online mentoring to a group of young people keen to work in your area of the industry, your organisation might be able to offer work experience to young people or you have a part-time or full-time role you can post for free on our jobs board.

Any opportunities available that help young people gain employment (no payment by young people required) we want to hear from you and Careers in Sport will promote them for free on our multiple platforms.

Examples of support

TVS Education Ltd has created 14 Trainee Activity Professional traineeships for people aged 16 – 24 years old who are unemployed and have previous little work experience.  The 6 – 12 weeks work experience will include a fully funded Level 2 Award in Leading Inclusive Physical Activities, a fully funded Level 2 Award or Holiday Club Activity Coaches in Multi-Sports and a fully-funded Level 3 Emergency Paediatric First Aid. For more details visit our jobs board.

Geoff Durbin has sports business experience working for Manchester City FC, Lancashire CC and Warrington Wolves

Geoff Durbin has had many commercially successful years at Manchester City FC, Lancashire County Cricket Club and Warrington Wolves RLFC and he has offered to conduct an online session for any young person aged 16 – 24 years old who is looking for employment in sports business.

Envee media are responsible for all England match day programmes as well as FA Cup semi-final and final programmes, FA Trophy, FA Vase, Women’s football and Community Shield programmes. The Editorial Director, Nick Judd, has offered to conduct an online Q and A webinar for any person aged 16 – 24 looking to establish a career in sports media.

Our fantastic business partners in our directory are also offering their support for the Jump Start scheme and full details of these opportunities will be announced soon.

Sign Up to Support Jump Start

Are you an organisation that has any potential voluntary, part-time, or full-time opportunities? For the remainder of 2020 Careers in Sport have made it free to post unlimited jobs on our website to support our scheme. To register your opportunity register on our website as an employer and submit the job specification on. Alternatively, email info@careers-in-sport.co.uk the job specification and your logo and we will promote the opportunity on our website and social media platforms free of charge.

Are you a professional working in the sports business, coaching, media or science and willing to offer your time, knowledge and expertise? We would love to hear from you and introduce you to young people looking for guidance on how to secure employment in your area.

To join the Jump-Start scheme please click the relevant button below

Or message us on one of our social media pages – Twitter, LinkedIn, Facebook, and Instagram using the tag #jumpstart

Together the sports industry can help young people with the ‘jump start’ they need to gain employment in these difficult times. 

Supported by