Jess Callaghan

Full Time Tutor - North

Jess is based in the North East and co-ordinates the training for StreetGames projects and partners in the North of England, she has over 10 years of experience coaching and tutoring sport in the community.

Jess’ first role was to deliver sporting activities to children at out of school and holiday clubs, during which time she completed her degree in Sport at Northumbria University.

Upon graduation she began volunteering for Depaul UK on a sports programme for BME groups in Tyne and Wear before moving into a professional capacity for the organisation, co-ordinating their sports project to re-engage people in disadvantaged areas of Newcastle.

Jess then moved on to the USA firstly coaching, progressing to developing sporting opportunities for an East coast organisation in New York. On returning to the UK, Jess began tutoring for a Premier League football club foundation as well as delivering on the Kicks programme.

Jess has a range of coaching, tutoring and assessing qualifications as well as several other certificates which compliment her role, and she continues to volunteer with a local kid’s club in her spare time.

Jess is a Newcastle United fan and has many great memories, her favourite being watching Tino Asprilla score a hatrick against Barcelona in the Champion’s league.

Rus Smith

Senior Tutor Developer - Midlands

Rus has over 18 years experience working in sport and developing coaches with the Football Association, StreetGames and Basketball.

A passion for changing the sporting offer and coaching as a whole for young people. He also supports projects day to day in the Black Country in the Midlands.

In 2017 Rus was awarded the accolade of the UKs Coach Developer of the year from the UK Coaching Awards from the work with coaches in the Coach Mate project. 

Rus’s previous experiences have been with Aston Villa, WBA FC, The FA and in Sport4Good StreetGames project George Salter in West Bromwich. 

Graham Helm

Part Time Tutor - North West

Graham has several years experience as a senior manager within a local authority youth service.

Graham is a confident and charismatic tutor and group facilitator who has in depth knowledge of working with young people and project development. Since losing his sight 4 years ago, Graham has also worked within the disability sector and often reflects upon his blindness to positively challenge groups around inclusion.

Mo Sarwar

Quality Assurance

Since moving away from a career in medical research, Mo has been playing and coaching squash for over 30 years and has represented Coventry, Warwickshire and England.

As a Level 4 squash coach Mo has developed players from grassroots level to international standard. His coaching roles include Warwickshire County Coach, Regional High Performance Coach, and Consultant National Coach. He also played a key role as senior coach educator and quality assurer for England Squash and Racketball (delivered and quality assured all of the squash coaching qualifications from L1 to L4).

For the last 6 years he has also been a Coach educator/assessor/IV/Lead Tutor for Coachwise and Sports Coach UK that enabled his to work with lots of different sports.

Mo is very passionate about coaching and learning and is always keen to improve his own skills by sharing good practices with other coaches and keeping up with new developments in the teaching/coaching sector. As part of his CPD he is always looking for and regularly attends training and standardisation days.

Working within the StreetGames family has provided Mo with an opportunity to share his knowledge and experience with a whole new group of people who are very passionate about the work they do. The work that StreetGames do with young people has actually taken his own learning and coaching to a new and much higher level.

Mo’s hobbies these days (time permitting) include doing some challenging walks in the country especially the Lake District and the Welsh Mountains.

Kelly Burdett

Tutor Developer - North West

Kelly is our Full-time Tutor Developer for the NW, currently the workforce lead for our key SE contract to upskill & develop volunteers, casual, PT & FT staff members, across a range of diverse StreetGames projects, programmes & places.

 

With a varied background in sport, having worked for a local authority, University & National Governing Body over the last 15 years, Kelly’s passion and focus has always been to develop individuals, using the power of sport and volunteering to build confidence, soft skills and empower young people to take action and achieve greater goals, within local communities.

 

Alongside this, Kelly also tutor’s & assesses on a range of external opportunities with a keen interest in the Mental Health and Well-being andemployability.  

In Kelly’s spare time she is an active player, casual coach and volunteer for Timperley Ladies Hockey club, alongside volunteering weekly for the NSPCC’s Childline, as a Youth Counsellor.

Kate Roberts

Tutor Developer - Yorkshire

Kate has been involved with StreetGames since the charities early days when she was a project lead at one of the first community delivery partners at George Salter Academy in West Bromwich. Kates passion for engaging women and girls in sport saw her lead a highly successful girls sport programme for 6 years which is still thriving now and completely led by the volunteers she trained up as youngsters when the project started.

In 2015 Kate was awarded StreetGames Coach of the Year for the work she had done as founder and head coach of West  Bromwich Netball Club.

Kate now works in the Yorkshire region splitting her time between being a DSA and a Tutor Developer and loves being out on the ground supporting local projects.

Kate is an absolute sport nut and spends her spare time playing, watching and coaching any sport she can!

Emily Hunter

Apprenticeship Tutor

A native of Somerset in the South West, Emily moved up to the mighty North East to play rugby in the Women’s Premiership competition - as part of the DMP Sharks side. Now, Emily is a StreetGames Tutor Developer for the north.

Emily has over 14 years of coaching experience within SEND and alternate Education and also has worked in Sports Development. She is a big believer in making the inactive active, and in her spare time coaches a women’s grass roots rugby team- Hartlepool Rovers, whilst also working to develop the next generation of female rugby stars as part of her coaching work in the North East Centre of Excellence.

Emily also has a cat called Geoffrey.

Andrew Diggle

Training Team Lead - Wales

'Diggsy' as he's known to colleages and participants works to lead the training team in Wales. With 19 years of experience in Sport and Community work across a multitude of roles - both at the operational and strategic level - Andrew is a highly knowledgeable leader in the sector and always happy to share his experiences with others.

With young people and personal development always at the forefront of his delivery, he delivers many aspects of StreetGames' training, from Doorstep Sports skills and activators to apprenticeships and other accredited qualifications. 'Diggsy' is also qualified to deliver first aid, as well as Mental Health First aid in Wales. He is also a qualified Assessor.

Diggsy currently works as a freelance tutor and Assessor across a variety of contracts, which includes his work with Streetgames. He also delivers work for Ballzone, Cimspa, Swansea City and other diverse partners, including Housing Associations.