After achieving Clubmark Accreditation, the first club to do so in the East Midlands and one of the first athletics clubs in the country, the club has grown and developed markedly. The club is now a county and regional flag ship club and certainly the largest in the East Midlands.

The approach England Athletics East Midlands (EAEM) has taken seems to have been successful. With regionally agreed re-accreditation criteria an initial meeting was arranged with the club to introduce the Re-accreditation Criteria to the club as well as look at their current file. It was an opportunity to highlight the benefits of Clubmark to the club and reinforce the values of why EAEM think Clubmark is so important. It also gave members of the club the chance to air their views with regard to Clubmark. It was an opportunity to go through a current strengths, weaknesses, threats and opportunities (SWOT) analysis to highlight areas of good and excellent practice but also to identify what areas within their club structure and practices they needed to improve. Actions and timescales were agreed between the club and the EAEM rep and another meeting was set to look at what the club had put in place with regard to the Re-accreditation process. The club looked at the actions within their own club structures and implemented the good practice solutions.

James Hayden, Community & Coach Development Officer for Notts AC said,

"As a club we have achieved so much over the last few years. We have a fantastic group of coaches and club volunteers. We have benefited so much from going through the Clubmark Accreditation process and for us to go through the Re-accreditation process just reinforces the importance for our club to follow good practice. The process was a fantastic opportunity to see what areas our club have excelled in but more importantly where our clubs needs to improve. The method of looking through the file and gathering more up to date evidence was time consuming but an exercise which our club very much needed to do!"

Clubmark has been embraced by Notts AC with great enthusiasm. Elements of good practice are now evident in all areas of the club from coaching, competition, club management, athlete welfare to issues surrounding equity and inclusion. By achieving Clubmark Accreditation the club has evidenced that they are committed to being a safe, effective and child friendly club and once again the club have achieved this status through the Clubmark Re-accreditation process.

Hopefully the club will go on to be as successful as recent months and years for much longer!

Club contact details:

Club contact - James Hayden / Charlie Wilcox
Contact number - 0115 9854289
Venue - Harvey Hadden Sports Complex, Nottingham
E-mail - notts-ac@connectfree.co.uk  / chassie@connectfree.co.uk
Website - www.nottsac.co.uk