We now move onto the fourth of six editorials showcasing the successful applications to the SD Europe Fund and their projects. In this piece, we discuss Israfans’ project which focuses on developing volunteer management in Irseali member-run football clubs.
Recap: What is the SD Europe Fund?
The objective of the SD Europe Fund is to enable the members of the SD Europe network to establish their own projects that further develop supporter involvement. The SD Europe Fund sees the distribution of €12,000 to its members; €9,000 to fund three nation-wide projects and €3,000 to fund three projects with exchange visits of member-run clubs within the network. Each project chosen was constructed with SD Europe’s four principles in mind; Democracy, Cooperation, Solidarity and Sustainability.
Recap: Who were the successful applicants to the SD Europe Fund?Member-run Football ClubsNational Supporters OrganisationsPAC Omonia 1948 (Cyprus)Israfans (Israel)AKS Zły (Poland)Unsere Kurve (Germany)FC Tarraco, CAP Ciudad de Murcia, UP Palencia (Spain)Supporters Direct Scotland
Momentum 2020
Who is involved in the project?
Israfans, the national supporters organisation in Israel, representing the interests of its member football clubs and supporters organisations. The organisation was formed in 2007 as a collective action responding to the sports-based community issues the country faced. Israfans offers advice and guidance to member-run clubs and supporters organisations in Israel, whilst championing their causes at national and international level.
What are the project’s activities?
The focus of ’Momentum 2020’ is to progress volunteer management and involvement at Israeli football clubs, with particular focus on member-run clubs. Following consultation with its members, Israfans has identified that volunteer management is an area that needs development. The project was developed in consultation with Israfans members and aims to support and guide member-run clubs to build strong internal volunteer management infrastructures to facilitate progression through workshops, consultation and expert advice.
Israfans will begin ‘Momentum 2020’ by hosting a kick-off workshop which will introduce key terminology, processes and responsibilities within volunteer management whilst also exchanging best practice and deep community mapping. Clubs within the network will then be consulted to ascertain where the greatest need is and which clubs are ready to take the next step in expanding their volunteer capacity. At the final stage of the project, Israfans will provide in-role training to the project’s volunteers to help develop the necessary skill sets: Each club will receive up to 8 hours of time with volunteer experts and will build a tailored volunteer strategy specific to the clubs’ needs and local context.
The project will be capped off in a closing workshop which will present the opportunity for each club to report back and share their achievements, the processes worked through and future objectives, allowing for the exchange of lessons learnt, maximising the overall benefit for each club.
What are the anticipated outcomes and impact at national and local/club level?
The project goal is for the clubs to center volunteer management as the area of focus for the next six months and understand best practice in volunteering as a main club goal, next to their sporting activities. Each selected club will create a sustainable volunteer base that works specifically to the needs of each club, with individuals in place that have the skillset to properly manage and recruit volunteers.
SD Europe will be present throughout to provide support to Israfans and its members to ensure they achieve the maximum possible yield from the project. We will bring you updates on this project and its events over the coming months.
Next week, we will bring you the final two projects from FASFE and Unsere Kurve so stay tuned to our social media channels.
Missed the previous articles in this series? Read about AKS Zły project here, PAC Omonia 1948’s project here and SD Scotland’s project here.
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