Queen’s Park Provide Positive Role Models
The relationship between Queen’s Park and Mount Florida Primary School was strengthened twice this week, firstly with the club’s Chief Executive Leeann Dempster visiting to talk about International Women’s Day, and then Head of Commercial Kieran Koszary and First Team player Alex Bannon invited in to discuss a number of important issues with the boys at the school.
Leeann discussed Equity, Self-worth and Building up others on her visit, with Kieran and Alex asked to chat about their views on Equity, the importance of male role models as well as mental health and the importance of friendship in supporting that.
Kieran explained: “I was delighted when the Head Teacher Mrs Gibson asked the club to follow up on Leeann’s visit with a talk that focussed on young male pupils. It was good that Alex came along as it allowed us to give our views from very different experiences, mine from an off the pitch role and Alex’s from working as a player in a male dominated changing room.”
“The two visits complemented each other as it is important for young males to not just be sexist themselves, but to call out other males out on being sexist, and to support girls reach equality of opportunity.”
The pupils also spoke with Robbie Kelly, who is the school’s active schools co-ordinator and works regularly with older children in the school.
Kieran said: “It was also really interesting to have a discussion around mental health and the importance of good friendships in supporting that. Being a footballer and working with young people in schools are very different jobs however the importance of good Mental Health and having supportive people around was a constant.”
Alex added: “Our Head Coach Owen Coyle often talks about one of the reasons for us having a good season so far is the strength of the group as opposed to being individuals. I would like to think that we are very good at supporting each other whether we are having a good game or a not so good one.”
“It was great to be asked and I hope that our visit helps strengthen our ties with our local community further.”
Caroline Gibson, Mount Florida School, Headteacher said: “Thank you so much to Alex, Kieran, and Robbie, for coming along to talk to the boys. When thinking about celebrating International Women’s Day I wanted to make the day special for the girls but also felt it was important to give the older boys the chance to think about the issue of equity and about positive male role models for themselves, rather than them potentially being influenced by negative figures online.
We were absolutely blown away by how well our visitors supported us to do that. They were open with the boys about the importance of good friendships, being influenced by positive people in their lives rather than unknown people online, how they deal with things that might affect their mental health e.g. injury and continuously ensured the conversation was covering what I had hoped for.
We are delighted that we have partners who are such positive role models for our children and are so supportive of the school and I hope we can do further work together on these kind of issues going forward.
Thank you again to the club for supporting us.”
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