Recently I celebrated my sixth anniversary of working at the active partnership for the region – and those six years have absolutely flown by.
When I first came into what was then Tyne & Wear Sport with the mandate to bring it together with Northumberland Sport, we were looking at a combined workforce of 16 people, a relationship that was still developing with our main funder, and a frustration that we weren’t really making a sustainable difference for our communities.
I’m immensely proud that we’re now a regional employer of 45 people, a trusted partner of Sport England and are constantly innovating to support our most disadvantaged communities through systemic working. The shift that we have made in the last six years – together as a team – to deliver the breadth and depth of expertise that we now offer is, in my view, truly remarkable.
A refreshed strategy to meet new realities
That’s the background to our refreshed strategy, which I’m proud to be sharing today.
A lot has changed since we launched our Rise Together strategy in 2021, including in 2024 a new Labour government and the introduction of the North East Combined Authority (NECA), and earlier this year the transfer of County Durham Sport into Rise to create a single active partnership for the NECA region. We’ve now updated our strategy so that it better reflects these and other changes, so that we support our communities and partners in the best way possible.
From those in our team who were here before I arrived through to our most recent recruits, I strongly believe that we now have an amazing staff team for the active partnership in our region, so a huge thank you to everyone who has contributed over the last six years to our collective success.
Read our strategy hereFind out more
Read our strategy for the full picture or take a look at our latest impact report to see the difference we make.
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