Hope, Health & Heroes: Inspiring Australian Communities to live better lives

Whilst we all enjoy playing and watching football it is often easy to forget the power our game has to improve the lives of people in Australian communities.  Football is not just about the 90 minutes played between two teams every weekend.  It also plays a significant role in bringing communities together, promoting lifestyle improvement and creating hope and opportunities for individuals of all backgrounds. 

In 2009, the PFA will launch community initiatives that mentor young people and focus on improving the health of Australians that live in disadvantaged areas of the community.

Our community program will harness the innate skills and attributes possessed by elite footballers and use them as a method for inspiring Australian communities in a way few stakeholders otherwise can. These skills and attributes include leadership, discipline, courage, adaptability and dedication and are all elements that drive success in life away from the football field – just as they do throughout a long and successful playing career.

In addition to positively influencing the lives of Australians, the PFA’s community initiatives will play a vital role in the development of ‘off field’ skills for our members.  Our members will develop the confidence to use their core skills away from the field of play and this confidence will be valuable to them when they are challenged with the task of forging a new career beyond the football field once their playing days are complete.

The link between our two Community programs

Our community programs focus on mentoring young people and improving Male health outcomes among the disadvantaged pockets of urban Australia. 

There is a significant amount of research highlighting that children from socially disadvantaged backgrounds tend to achieve less at school and, are less likely to stay on at school or enter further or higher education. They are also more likely in the future to be unemployed or in low paid jobs.

These students have higher levels of ‘in classroom’ need and require additional teaching support to achieve the same learning outcomes attained by other groups of students in our society.

The research has also found that there is a strong correlation between the children with the greatest learning needs and their parents’ occupation.  

These programs will not only improve the lives of those we touch, but also position football as a responsible and caring industry and contribute to the personal development of the players involved in the delivery of the programs.

Program Delivery: the initiation of new partnerships

The PFA is delighted with the initiation of a number of new partnerships for the delivery of our community strategy.  All of the PFA’s partners share a desire to promote lifestyle improvement and work collectively to build stronger Australian communities.  These partners are:

LUCRF Super: As Australia’s first industry super fund, LUCRF has over 180,000 members and approximately $2.1 billion in funds under management. LUCRF’s aim is to provide consistently competitive returns on their superannuation funds for their members.  Whilst achieving these returns, they also aim to provide excellent service at a minimal cost to their members.

The NUW: The National Union of Workers (NUW) is a large and diverse general Union with members in almost all industries.  The NUW has around 90,000 members and employs approximately 140 staff across all offices throughout Australia.  The workplaces covered by the NUW share football’s diversity and the PFA’s passion for the game.   The thousands of workers who belong to the NUW and their families connect deeply with football through their multicultural heritage and will enjoy the connection provided to the game that this new partnership brings them. 

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