Greenhouse Sports

Growing up in poverty puts a good childhood at risk, threatening secure relationships and a decent education. In London alone, there are currently 800,000 children at risk of leaving school with no qualifications, damaging their career prospects and increasing the chance of mental health problems, largely because they are growing up in poverty.

Greenhouse Sports believes that every child deserves a fair chance to succeed: they work to improve the life chances of young people in deprived areas of London by helping them develop essential life skills, increase their engagement with education and give them  positive activities to take part in outside of school through sport. 

For over 20 years, Greenhouse Sports has employed a team of frontline coaching staff who are based permanently in secondary and Special Educational Needs & Disabilities schools across London, delivering mentoring and coaching all year round. Every year, they give over 7,000 students connection to a trusted adult, the physical and emotional benefit of sport and the life skills that will help them make the most of opportunities beyond school, and research shows that their participants attend an average of 5 more school days per year and achieve 30-40% higher grades in Maths and English compared to non-Greenhouse classmates.

They currently have programmes spanning 17 London boroughs, working in partnership with 60 partner schools at any one time as well at the Greenhouse Centre - their community sport facility in North Westminster. Each partner school has a permanent Greenhouse coach to coach either table tennis, basketball, volleyball, tennis or multisport, offering a range of activities that extend well beyond the school day and school week. These extracurricular sessions run every day and include breakfast clubs, after school clubs and activities over the weekend plus school holiday camps (all free and accessible) so that they can take part in positive activities with their friends in a safe space with a Greenhouse coach. Many of the participants do not have the financial resources to access alternative activities and so these no-cost to parents and carers sessions provide an invaluable alternative to spending time in places which may be much riskier for them.

“We are incredibly grateful to players of People’s Postcode Lottery for their continued support over the past 6 years. Covid has made life in London for children from lower socio-economic backgrounds all the more difficult. Players of People’s Postcode Lottery are helping to make sure that we emerge from this crisis together, ensuring that poverty is not a barrier to reaching potential for any child. Thanks to players we are able to be there for our children, before the start of school until well after the school day ends, all year round.” - Bethany Kinsella, Greenhouse Sports Director of Fundraising

For further information, visit www.greenhousesports.org.