Scottish Women in Sports Awards nominations

jogscotland has been shortlisted for two awards at this year’s Scottish Women in Sport Awards. The news is recognition of huge amounts of dedication and hard work by our jog leaders, joggers and staff across the country.

jogscotland as a whole has been shortlisted for the Frame Innovation in Sport award, and our jogging group at Dundee International Women’s Centre is up for Kubenet Communities Club of the Year.

Among the achievements noted in the nomination for the Frame Innovation in Sport award was the work done by our Community Strides project, which has seen women from BME (black & minority ethnic) communities in Dundee and Edinburgh supported to become more active. With sessions tailored to their requirements, kit drives via the wider jog leader community, and support from jogscotland project staff, the groups at Dundee International Women’s Centre (pictured) and Saheliya have been a great success. Also recognised is our jogability project, which specifically targets girls and young women with disabilities and additional support needs, adapting existing junior jogscotland materials to make them appropriate for different groups of youngsters to enjoy. That’s all in addition to our day-to-day operations – as a whole, jogscotland has a female membership of around 80%; we support people to get active at all ages and abilities, through community groups, Mums on the Run sessions and workplace jog groups. Our jog leaders have this year embraced our partnership with SAMH (Scottish Association for Mental Health), with more than 600 of them training in mental health awareness and pledging to be open to mental health conversations at their groups.

The Kubenet Communities Club of the Year nomination specifically recognises the jogscotland group at Dundee International Women’s Centre (DIWC). We attended the centre regularly for a number of months to gain an understanding of the needs of DIWC and get to know the women from the local communities who come along to the centre. With the help and support of DIWC, we held taster sessions with simple exercise routines and discussions indoors, slowly building up confidence to venture out on to the surrounding streets for a jog. For many of the women taking part, this may be the first time they will have exercised in public, but they now have an established running group and are out and about enjoying getting active together. The group was set up under the Community Strides project, with funding from the Changing Lives Fund and support from our partners SAMH.

jogscotland development officer Jo Stevens said: “SWiS is a great organisation and we’re so pleased to be shortlisted for these awards. We work hard to keep bringing the physical and mental health benefits of an active life to as many people as possible. We’re keen never rest on our laurels, and are always looking for new ways to reach out to people who we might not already have worked with. Continuing our every day work, while also extending our reach through Community Strides and jogability, has been really rewarding to everyone involved, and we’re delighted to receive this recognition – and particularly proud of the joggers and jog leaders who have made it all happen.”