Second Chance

An opportunity for socially excluded young adults

Since 1997 the five universities of the North East have been working together on regional development; now they have created Sport Universities North East England (SUNEE) to help transform the delivery of sport across the region.

Supported by all the main sports organisations in the North East, SUNEE has piloted a successful programme entitled Second Chance which trains university students as coaches, and then engages them in a coaching role with adults with a substance misuse background to teach them sport, engage them in regular physical activity and move some towards becoming coaches themselves.

Initially working as part of the Drug Intervention Programme, they are now moving to weekly rather than sessional programmes, and plan to build on their current success to help 400 former drug addicts and homeless people over the next year.

The Tony Blair Foundation will support SUNEE’s Second Chance programme.

Neil Hurren, from SUNEE, will sit on the Foundation’s Advisory Board, to ensure the Foundation has at its heart a focus on helping those most marginalised in society to develop their talent.

“I’ve been down to the depths of despair and at rock bottom and there were times when I thought the drugs would beat me. In effect I was dead for eight years but the coaching programme brought me to life again.”
Davey Lacey, Second Chance programme participant