On Tuesday 5 May, 60 tamariki from two Timaru schools hopped on buses and headed to Aorangi Park to give hockey a go.

The Hockey South Canterbury, Have a Go programme has set out to provide opportunities for less advantaged tamariki and rangatahi through the means of hockey.

With the help of students from Timaru Boys High and Timaru Girls High schools to run the sessions and funding from Tū Manawa Active Aotearoa, Hockey South Canterbury are able to remove barriers preventing participation in this sport, allowing tamariki and rangatahi from these low decile schools to give hockey a go.

Hockey South Canterbury have been aware for a while that there were children in their community that have been unable to participate in hockey. They have seen tamariki and rangatahi try hockey through Sport Canterbury holiday programmes and Have a Go opportunities but from there, they have been unable to continue with the sport.

From this, the team at Hockey South Canterbury began working on a way to provide these tamariki and rangatahi a better opportunity to play hockey. Challenges that needed to be overcome included transport, equipment (stick, shin pads, mouth guard etc.) and turf costs.

Hockey South Canterbury partnered with two schools who indicated an enjoyment in Hockey but did not have school teams that participate at any level. The Tū Manawa Active Aotearoa fund enabled this connect to become more formalised and resulted in a participation opportunity.

A programme was designed for Timaru South School and Oceanview School with the hopes to achieve positive attitudes around sport for the tamariki. Desired outcomes were holistic; including promoting the benefits of team sport, tamariki learning to work together with others and embracing diversity by girls and boys learning together.

Teacher Rose from Oceanview School says that the programme is, “A very cool experience for all the kids involved who haven’t had this type of exposure to sport before."

The programme achieves all this, while allowing the tamariki to experience a fun and exciting programme, make friends, be active and explore an opportunity they might not have experienced otherwise.

After a morning of moulding brand-new mouth guards, the tamariki of Oceanview School and Timaru South School were fizzing to get off the bus and onto the turf, some for the very first time.

Hockey South Canterbury board member Susan Coker described the day as a, “Fantastic opportunity to be able to offer hockey to these schools and continue to do so throughout the hockey season."

Parent helpers echoed this stating it was great to see the kids thrive in the new environment, having fun and being excited to give hockey a go.

Amy Dunbar, Deputy Principal at Timaru South School was grateful for the support from Hockey South Canterbury and funding from Tū Manawa Active Aotearoa for this programme.

All children involved were provided hockey gear including a stick, bag, mouth guard and shin pads and transport barriers were removed.

All this was possible due to the help of Hockey South Canterbury and the funding from Tū Manawa.

“It’s all about tamariki being able to give hockey a go, without being too focused on the rules or the costs associated with doing so,” says Amy.

Hockey South Canterbury will continue to run this programme for the entire 2021 hockey season.

Read more Tū Manawa case studies here