The Agency
Creating young leaders of change through the agency
In 2023 Sport England, using a tool called the Place Needs Classification (PNC), identified areas of priority around the country for their investment. Using this we learned Millbrook and Redbridge West, Thornhill and Weston are all areas of priority.
Since 2024 we’ve been coordinating a Place Partnership Board in Southampton as part of Sport England Place Investment. Place based working is embedded within each community so it’s been important to work in collaboration from the very beginning.
The Southampton Place Partnership Board is made up of colleagues from:
This group have supported with insights from their networks and communities and offered advice and consultation.
There is already lots of work happening with communities, here’s some of the highlights:
A team of local young researchers are already onboard, recruited through LifeLab at the University of Southampton. They’ve helped to answer questions like what people would like to do, where would they like to do it and what will help motivate them to keep going.
Once we have further insight from the community we’ll be working with activity providers and community spaces to bring their suggestions to life.
Short bursts of activity will pop up across Thornhill, Millbrook and Redbridge West and Weston so people get the chance to experience the activities they have suggested. People will then feedback whether it works, needs adjusting or they need something else entirely. From there we can look at how to co-create sustainable, long lasting action.
There are still lots of opportunities for people to get involved. An important part of this will be looking at how we connect everyone involved in creating more active communities together. The partnership board will be looking at bringing the following types of people and organisations together;
Helping us tackle inactivity to boost health and happiness
