Nelson boxing gym delivers positive change through youth programme

Nelson’s community boxing gym, Victory Boxing, reaches out to people from all walks of life, but the heart of the organisation is its youth programme – and now that programme is in the spotlight in a new video from Skills Active Aotearoa.

Programme director Paul Hampton advises that “our starting age is eight and we go right up to about 80 years of age.

“We probably have 450 kids in our youth programme now. Our primary goal… is to see our young people feeling in a place where they can contribute to society, they have good feelings about themselves, and their self-esteem is strong.”

Hampton adds that the Victory team also has special sessions for people with Parkinson’s disease, cancer survivors, victims of abuse, and a number of other groups.

The Victory coaching team give their time and skills for free, so it’s important to Victory that they are provided with quality professional development.

Through an on-job qualification process with Skills Active, Victory has supported six of its skilled staff to complete the National Certificate in Recreation and Sport (Developing Coach) (Level 3).

Hampton notes that “our [coaches] are in the gym anyway doing the work - so it was just giving some structure to that through the training, giving lots of mentoring, and giving them an opportunity to ask questions and keep improving what they were doing.”