Hello to all, once again I come to you on bended knee but this time I’m asking for something which is close to my own heart.
Some of you may know that I run a Taekwondo club near my home, it’s not big and fancy and doesn’t have hundreds of members. Many don’t realise however that I’m actually a globally qualified Para Taekwondo Instructor, 1 of only 8 in the UK and Ireland (http://parataekwondo.org/certified-instructors/). I have a few students with various special needs from physical conditions ranging from Spina Bifida and blindness, to kids with various forms of autism and behavioural disorders. We also teach regular kids and adults at the same time!! We are part of an association which has the only 9 clubs in the whole of Northern Ireland who teach Olympic Taekwondo and have submitted a team to the Commonwealth Games.
We are completely self-funded and by that I mean every stitch of equipment from kick pads to body armour has so far been paid for by me, including coaching courses often running into several hundred pounds apiece, which allows me to get insurance. The last one was £265 which was run by British Taekwondo, the governing body in the UK and the purpose of this was for them to assess me and make sure I was of sufficient standard to teach, after having been an instructor for the best part of two decades…….
It costs approximately £135 to kit out one person with a full set of body armour, I have never had any kind of financial assistance or grant from anyone and I only actually charge about half of the class for lessons but we’re about halfway to kitting out all of the students. Some of them have their own stuff but a lot of kids wouldn’t be there if they had to pay as they simply can’t afford it due to people losing jobs, being single mums and so on. I’m also a bit of a soft touch when it comes to people who have 3 kids as I know how expensive life gets with 3 of my own. Mostly I just get them to chuck me a fiver for the class instead of £3 per child. It’s safe to say I’ll not be retiring early.
We are badly in need of training mats which come in at around £2000 for the insurance approved equipment and to put it bluntly I can't afford it by myself, so I am riding a bicycle around a local 100 mile course named Lap the Lough to try and raise a bit of funding, I would appreciate anyone who feels like sponsoring me, a pound, a fiver, anything would be welcomed. If anyone can spare something to auction off that would also be great and I’ll be in touch with the banner advertisers soon to beg and scrounge whatever I can
. I’d like to make it clear, I’m not a cyclist, I only bought a road bike this year to do this event although I have done a fair bit of mountain biking in the past few years it is nowhere near the distance I have to do in August. My wife who is also a Taekwondo instructor will be doing the cycle with me. We are aiming for £500 between us but anything will be a bonus and will go directly to club equipment, no admin fees. Should we by some miracle raise more than the cost of the mats then we’ll invest in as much protective equipment as we can with whatever is left over.
I know I’m not a charity and I know it’s not a patch on some of the reasons we have raised money before but even to raise enough money to pay the hall rent for a month or two would be a massive help and is genuinely making a difference to the lives of some of these kids and their parents. I’ve had parents report back from doctors and hospital specialists that Taekwondo is helping with everything from focusing autistic children’s attention to improving the balance of a 10 year old boy who has a tube draining fluid from his brain to his stomach. It also gives parents a much needed hour and a half respite each week. I know how hard some of the children can be to deal with for that 90 minutes, never mind 24/7.
I can’t guarantee I’ll be churning out Olympians but the pathway is at least laid out to give them an opportunity.
I'm undecided as to whether paypal is best for people or a go fund me type page, open to suggestions on that one.
Thank you all in advance.
Jim
Some of you may know that I run a Taekwondo club near my home, it’s not big and fancy and doesn’t have hundreds of members. Many don’t realise however that I’m actually a globally qualified Para Taekwondo Instructor, 1 of only 8 in the UK and Ireland (http://parataekwondo.org/certified-instructors/). I have a few students with various special needs from physical conditions ranging from Spina Bifida and blindness, to kids with various forms of autism and behavioural disorders. We also teach regular kids and adults at the same time!! We are part of an association which has the only 9 clubs in the whole of Northern Ireland who teach Olympic Taekwondo and have submitted a team to the Commonwealth Games.
We are completely self-funded and by that I mean every stitch of equipment from kick pads to body armour has so far been paid for by me, including coaching courses often running into several hundred pounds apiece, which allows me to get insurance. The last one was £265 which was run by British Taekwondo, the governing body in the UK and the purpose of this was for them to assess me and make sure I was of sufficient standard to teach, after having been an instructor for the best part of two decades…….
It costs approximately £135 to kit out one person with a full set of body armour, I have never had any kind of financial assistance or grant from anyone and I only actually charge about half of the class for lessons but we’re about halfway to kitting out all of the students. Some of them have their own stuff but a lot of kids wouldn’t be there if they had to pay as they simply can’t afford it due to people losing jobs, being single mums and so on. I’m also a bit of a soft touch when it comes to people who have 3 kids as I know how expensive life gets with 3 of my own. Mostly I just get them to chuck me a fiver for the class instead of £3 per child. It’s safe to say I’ll not be retiring early.
We are badly in need of training mats which come in at around £2000 for the insurance approved equipment and to put it bluntly I can't afford it by myself, so I am riding a bicycle around a local 100 mile course named Lap the Lough to try and raise a bit of funding, I would appreciate anyone who feels like sponsoring me, a pound, a fiver, anything would be welcomed. If anyone can spare something to auction off that would also be great and I’ll be in touch with the banner advertisers soon to beg and scrounge whatever I can
. I’d like to make it clear, I’m not a cyclist, I only bought a road bike this year to do this event although I have done a fair bit of mountain biking in the past few years it is nowhere near the distance I have to do in August. My wife who is also a Taekwondo instructor will be doing the cycle with me. We are aiming for £500 between us but anything will be a bonus and will go directly to club equipment, no admin fees. Should we by some miracle raise more than the cost of the mats then we’ll invest in as much protective equipment as we can with whatever is left over.I know I’m not a charity and I know it’s not a patch on some of the reasons we have raised money before but even to raise enough money to pay the hall rent for a month or two would be a massive help and is genuinely making a difference to the lives of some of these kids and their parents. I’ve had parents report back from doctors and hospital specialists that Taekwondo is helping with everything from focusing autistic children’s attention to improving the balance of a 10 year old boy who has a tube draining fluid from his brain to his stomach. It also gives parents a much needed hour and a half respite each week. I know how hard some of the children can be to deal with for that 90 minutes, never mind 24/7.
I can’t guarantee I’ll be churning out Olympians but the pathway is at least laid out to give them an opportunity.
I'm undecided as to whether paypal is best for people or a go fund me type page, open to suggestions on that one.
Thank you all in advance.
Jim
