Leaps and Bounds have helped Valence United Football Club secure a grant from the Football Association to refurbish derelict changing rooms at Valence Park in Barking, Essex.

Valence United run a popular children's football club at the Park but are fed-up with not having any changing rooms. Eddie Davidson, Secretary of the Club called Leaps and Bounds for some friendly advice and a little professional help.

"We were sick to death of the kids having to change outside - the changing rooms were dirty, had no electrics and were badly vandalised. Basically, they were totally unusable."

With the help of Leaps and Bounds, Eddie and his team put together a package of ideas for turning Valence Park into a really pleasant place to play- somewhere the children would be proud of.

Typical of so many people who run youth sport projects, the volunteers at Valence United were constantly frustrated by the facilities available. Keeping children enthusiastic is difficult when facilities are so poor. The ideas and dedication were there in abundance, the Club simply needed a little professional help to get their ideas off the ground.

In working together, Valence and Leaps and Bounds generated some big ideas but Phase One was all about getting the existing changing rooms into use. After the initial brainstorming sessions, a basic programme of works was devised.

Leaps and Bounds Director, Henry Woodlock explains:

"All Valence really needed was a helping hand. We sat down and went through what the Club did and what it would like to do in the future. We tried to assess what the Club felt it had to offer and what was preventing it improving its services. This broke the problem down and we then focused on the first task. After writing a brief development plan, a summary of our ideas, we made the funding application. Now that sufficient funds have been raised, the construction work can commence."

Having generated some big ideas now and completed the first phase, it could be the beginning of great things at Valence Park - watch this space for updates and check our feature in Frontiers for a glimpse of the future!