Fundraising Officer – All Aboard Youth Rowing (formerly Warrington Youth Rowing)

Hours: Full-time

Job Type: 2-year Fixed Term Contract with potential for extension

Salary: £32,500 – £35,000 pa

Are you a great fundraiser with an interest in helping a growing and successful charity based in North-West England? All Aboard Youth Rowing – formerly known as Warrington Youth Rowing – is a charity established to support disadvantaged children achieve life skills using the sport of rowing.  An exciting opportunity has arisen for a creative fundraising professional to coordinate and achieve additional funding.

The Role

The Fundraising Officer will coordinate all fundraising activities in line with the Charity’s overall strategy and sustainability plans.  Working closely with the Chief Executive Officer, the Fundraising Officer will identify sources of income and build good working relationships with funders to achieve agreed funding targets.

The role is based in the North-West of England working from home and ideally, the Fundraising Officer will be in one of the following locations:

• Cheshire
• Merseyside
• Greater Manchester

Key areas of responsibility for the Fundraising Officer include:

• Contribute and assist with the development of a fundraising strategy for the Charity.
• Achieve the agreed funding target of newly sourced funding within the specified and agreed timeframe.
• Identify potential sources of funding and maximise opportunities to secure funding and grow and develop income.
• Develop relationships with funders aiming to achieve and maintain long-term partnerships.
• Maintain a database of funding sources, funders, and funding partners.
• Apply for funding by letters of interest or application forms dependent on the funding organisation’s requirements.

About You

The successful candidate will be highly motivated and have a background in fundraising.  They must be able to demonstrate a strong track record of securing funding from national funders, preferably for the youth or sport sector. They will have experience of monitoring the impact of community projects.  In addition, they will be adaptable and comfortable working on both their own initiative and as a team player.

About the Organisation

The Charity has a desire to grow and become more sustainable, the Fundraising Officer will play a key role in achieving this ambition.  The aim of the Charity is to enhance the life skills of disadvantaged youngsters using the sport of rowing.  The charity works closely with Henley Stewards Charitable Trust and British Rowing to help achieve this aim.

All Aboard Youth Rowing run programmes in Warrington, Merseyside, Northwich, Greater Manchester, Runcorn and North Staffordshire.

Further information

For further information, please see the job description.

Application

To apply, please send a CV and covering email to Elaine Nesbit elaine@warringtonyouthrowing.org.uk

Close Date: 9.00 am on Friday 3^rd May 2024

The new academic year that started in September 2022 was yet another step forward. Greater Manchester Youth Rowing, based at Agecroft Rowing Club sprang into life. Else where it was a case of sustaining and growing our current sites.

The schools in Warrington, some of them now seven years into the project, soon got to grips with things and most of them where active by early October. We lost two of the schools for various reasons and they took a year out but promised to return next year. We did, though, gain two new schools in the shape of Penketh High School and St Gregory’s Catholic High School.  The coaching team at WYR is now well versed in the way we do things. They continue to impress with their dedication and willingness to adapt and improvise. The coaching team at WYR was bolstered by the addition of a British Rowing Grow Coach in the shape of Quin Dunne.

Action on The West Float Dock continued at a pace with plenty of action on the water. North Liverpool Academy increased their sessions to three per week and three other schools increased their sessions to twice weekly. We were delighted to be able to introduce two new schools to the Mersey programme. South Wirral High School and Dixons Broadgreen both joined the fold during the spring term. Our student based coaching team at Mersey are performing well and are always up for a challenge, especially as they work on a commercial dock. I’m sure we will all miss the navy ship, that has now moved and was an interesting feature on the skyline.

The river Weaver saw plenty of activity with local schools continuing to participate and utilise the modern facilities at Northwich Rowing Club. The enthusiasm of the schools in Northwich is always rewarding to see and unsurprisingly they did very well at the Youth Rowing Regatta in July. Winsford High School capped their year by winning the Roger Chicken Trophy as the best performing school over the year. The number of schools increased as we lost one but gained Hartford and Rudheath. Kev Jump leads a well-established group of coaches at Northwich, and they have developed a very inclusive and caring style that works well with our youngsters.

Agecroft Rowing Club now play host to Greater Manchester Youth Rowing, and it is interesting to see the youngsters working alongside athletes that are on the GB pathway. Six schools eventually signed up with five of them coming from United Learning, a large trust with schools all over England. Our coaches at GMYR are by in large young adults and some of them are on the GB pathway. Its great to see these coaches passing on the skills that they have been learning, whilst being coached themselves by GB coaches!

The popularity and growth of Youth Rowing carries on and we have started planning for our next site to be based at Runcorn Rowing Club. Onward we march!

Rocking the Boat, the outreach conference that we help to organise with London Youth Rowing and Henley Stewards Charitable Trust took place in October and I’m delighted to say that we played a major part, organising several speakers. Scott Whitfield from LJMU was able to highlight his work and his study into our work and I’m pleased to say it was a big hit with the audience. Rocking the Boat 3 is in the planning stages.

We managed to hold our two Youth Rowing competitions this year, despite a teachers strike on our original regatta date. The indoor competition was held at Birchwood High School on 25^th January. We had our biggest entry to date with 375 young rowers taking part. In July we eventually held our regatta with a slightly reduced entry due to a teachers strike on the original date. We were pleased to welcome along Siobhan Cassidy, Chair of The Boat Race Company as a guest and she was delighted to see so many youngsters taking part in a regatta for the first time.  It was a radically altered format and in general it worked well. Knutsford and Winsford were the winners on the day.

Based on the results of the indoor competition we were able to select a team to take part in the National Junior Rowing Championships at The Copper Box Arena in London. All four of our areas were represented and we sent the largest team to date, comprising 40 rowers and 35 adults.

Henley Stewards Charitable Trust continue to be our principal sponsor and we are very grateful to receive this cornerstone funding. They also give us valuable assistance at the time of Henley Royal Regatta, and this enables us to invite school leaders to attend the regatta and experience what is possible for their youngsters.

The Boat Race Company have also provided funding and we even got a mention on the BBC with their live coverage of the Boat Race.

Our old girls Iffy and Elle continue to do us proud with their rowing scholarships in the USA. Iffy at Tulsa University and Elle about to start at Washington State.

The fifth Indoor Rowing event took place at Birchwood Leisure and Tennis Complex on Wednesday 25th January 2023.

Participants from all four rowing programmes – Warrington, Northwich, Mersey and Greater Manchester – took part. For Greater Manchester, this was their first experience of the event. There was a total of 372 youngsters representing 23 schools. They raced as individuals in a timed race of either 2, 3, 4, 5 or 6 minutes depending on age group and also took part in a 4-person relay team competing over a distance of 2,000 metres. The event was a huge success and everyone had lots of fun as can be seen in the photos.

Big thanks go to the volunteers, coaches and Trustees who supported the event and ensured it went without a hitch.