Chester RUFC HeadGuard Programme

Dear Parents and Players.
After such a strange year, we recognise the huge strain upon our players, coaches and families and we really wanted to develop a mental health scheme which allows for every member of our rugby family to feel comfortable and supported enough to ask for help or guidance should they need it.
The statistics regarding child mental health are troubling, and with so much media focus upon opening up the conversations around mental health, as a committee we really wanted to have a system in place to allow for that support to be available, and for conversations to become normalised.
We are really happy to be able to share with you our HeadGuard programme, the attached document is very self explanatory, and we launch this today at the start of National Mental Health Awareness week.
This is the first initiative of its kind in the North West, possibly the UK, aimed at the youth players of a club, so we really will need your feedback to allow for its growth and development. We have been working with Sale Sharks and Looseheadz who are fully supporting the HeadGuard programme and have been very open at how progressive Chester RUFC are with getting a programme in place for Mental Health Awareness, and we look forward to developing awareness events and training session with them in the near future.
"LooseHeadz are very proud to be aligned with Chester RUFC on their mission to support the mental health of their players, members and volunteers.
We’re excited to get started and hopefully this can be the start of a special partnership where together we can #TackleTheStigma" - Rob Shotton, Founder of Looseheadz.
‘Really excited to see Chester RUFC are making mental health part of their agenda at their club, after the last 12 months. Excellent to see all the progress that’s being made’. Eddie Owens, Mental Health lead, Sale Sharks.
We are incredibly lucky to have Mark and Andy agree to help head up this initiative, they are available at the club on Sundays, but neither will mind having a chat if you need some guidance. A huge thanks to them.
If you have any questions, or wish to join us in developing this programme, please contact Ian or Gemma, it goes without saying that if you need to discuss anything at all with any of us, we will do all we can to help.

The MJ Exec committee.