Youth Engagement with Aston Villa Foundation

Our work with young people sees us work with children in communities and schools within the immediate areas surrounding Villa Park. 

Our provisions for young people offer a holistic landscape of opportunities to support them on their life journey. 

Explore our programmes and provisions below

Premier League Inspires is a personal development programme, funded by the Premier League and supported by Professional Footballers Association (PFA) through the Premier League Charitable Fund. 

The programme uses the power of football to inspire young people aged 11-to-25 to develop the personal skills and positive attitudes needed to succeed in life. The programme is predominantly delivered in secondary schools, but also provides support as they move through the education system and early adulthood.

Premier League Inspires empowers participants to develop personal, social, employability and life-skills, through a series of regular face-to-face group sessions, mentoring, workshops and social-action projects, providing pupils with the help they need now and supporting them to plan for their future. 

The programme also aims to support participants in training, education and employment opportunities, and creates opportunities for students to give back to their school and local community. 

Funded through a central partnership between the Premier League, the Aston Villa Foundation delivers Premier League Kicks sessions at various locations across Birmingham, engaging with over 1,400 participants each year. The programme uses the power of football and the value of sports participation to help hard-to-reach youngsters in some of the most high-need areas.

Aston Villa’s Premier League Kicks aims to increase the number of young people developing a sporting habit for life and to create youth-led responsive projects with a culture of volunteering. 

At a local level, the club is partnering with West Midlands Police, to break down barriers between the police and young people and encourage participation into the programme as a means to combat crime and anti-social behaviour.

As part of our Premier League Kicks sessions, we also run a mentoring initiative aimed at using sport and youth work to have a positive influence on young people who are on the cusp of offending and/or are known youth offenders. 

The Villa Intervention Programme (VIP) works with young people on a one-to-one basis to provide guidance, offer support and create opportunities for young people to move onto a positive pathway. 

The primary aim of VIP is to ensure that young people do not reoffend and learn key life skills that will help them with prospects.

Working in partnership with Birmingham City Council Prevent Team, our Home Office Funded Prevent project is delivered with the aim to empower young people from targeted communities to challenge and build resilience against negative influences and be diverted away from radicalisation, extremism and terrorism.

This is delivered through weekly sports provision in high priority wards and settings, small group interventions and one-2-one mentoring sessions. Workshops on Prevent and radicalisation are delivered to young people aged 8–18 years old in out of school settings.

We also deliver Community Cohesion Sports Tournaments and cultural visits whereby young people will be enabled to develop respectful relationships with other faiths and cultures.

Premier League Changemakers is helping young women and girls to build confidence and leadership skills. 

Working with the Aston Villa Foundation, the programme supports young women by inspiring, empowering and equipping them with the tools to develop a positive attitude towards leadership. 

Delivered alongside their studies, Changemakers is delivered through Premier League Kicks and Premier League Inspires, engaging nationally over 1200 young women and girls to be able to access leadership training, as well as sports and physical activity. 

Partnered with UNITAR (United Nations Institute for Training and Research) each participant receives a qualification which covers topics such as mental health, confidence, resilience, teamwork with the goal of building up the next generation of female leaders.