Changing mindsets and building resilience are the cornerstones of the InPower Academy in Wolverhampton, which uses martial arts to engage children who are at risk of entering, or already involved with, the Youth Justice System.
InPower, which has joined Levelling the Playing Field’s network of Local Delivery Partners in the West Midlands, achieves its positive impact through two main programmes: Unbreakables and F.Y.T Clubs.
Unbreakables
Participants are taken on a 12-week journey with the theoretical element covering understanding fear, gratitude, and what they can and can’t control. These themes are blended into the physical sessions. Journaling is also a key element.
Coaches are role models, often with lived experience of the same issues facing the participants. Resilience, holistic change and social development are the desired outcomes.
InPower’s 2019 impact report showed 85% of Unbreakables participants are from BAME backgrounds. The programme also has a primary-age equivalent called ‘Warriors of Wellbeing’ focusing on self-discovery and emotional intelligence.
“The philosophy around Unbreakables is that no matter what life throws at us, we can come back from it,” says founder Daryl Chambers (pictured below). “All of us coaches, myself included, have been through stuff, and there will be things in these young people’s lives that come out of nowhere and hit them hard too. In our first session, we’ll say: ‘Imagine having the inner strength to know that no matter what happens, you can deal with it.’
“We do an absolutely exhausting fitness test early on, then we tell them they’re going to do it again, but better and faster than last time. They can’t believe it! But it’s a mindset technique of visualisation and accountability. No word of a lie, 98% of the young people do it better the second time around. It shows them that I’m not just going to tell them how great they are, I’m going to let them discover how great they can be themselves.”
InPower, which has joined Levelling the Playing Field’s network of Local Delivery Partners in the West Midlands, achieves its positive impact through two main programmes: Unbreakables and F.Y.T Clubs.
Unbreakables
Participants are taken on a 12-week journey with the theoretical element covering understanding fear, gratitude, and what they can and can’t control. These themes are blended into the physical sessions. Journaling is also a key element.
Coaches are role models, often with lived experience of the same issues facing the participants. Resilience, holistic change and social development are the desired outcomes.
InPower’s 2019 impact report showed 85% of Unbreakables participants are from BAME backgrounds. The programme also has a primary-age equivalent called ‘Warriors of Wellbeing’ focusing on self-discovery and emotional intelligence.
“The philosophy around Unbreakables is that no matter what life throws at us, we can come back from it,” says founder Daryl Chambers (pictured below). “All of us coaches, myself included, have been through stuff, and there will be things in these young people’s lives that come out of nowhere and hit them hard too. In our first session, we’ll say: ‘Imagine having the inner strength to know that no matter what happens, you can deal with it.’
“We do an absolutely exhausting fitness test early on, then we tell them they’re going to do it again, but better and faster than last time. They can’t believe it! But it’s a mindset technique of visualisation and accountability. No word of a lie, 98% of the young people do it better the second time around. It shows them that I’m not just going to tell them how great they are, I’m going to let them discover how great they can be themselves.”
F.Y.T Clubs
F.Y.T stands for ‘Find Your Truth’ and is an open-access programme operating in three different communities in Wolverhampton between 4pm-6pm that are affected by anti-social behaviour, gangs and criminality.
The clubs offer free diversionary activities that can centre around martial arts or accredited learning, whichever avenue each young person wants to explore.
“Being around positive people and opportunities, with role models they can relate to and peer leadership, is what it’s all about,” says Daryl. “it’s simply a case of what they want to do. I don’t think we’ve had any person saying they want to be on the street corner selling drugs, so we just make sure we offer a range of options, whether that’s our sporting programme or even signposting them somewhere else to go make music.”
F.Y.T stands for ‘Find Your Truth’ and is an open-access programme operating in three different communities in Wolverhampton between 4pm-6pm that are affected by anti-social behaviour, gangs and criminality.
The clubs offer free diversionary activities that can centre around martial arts or accredited learning, whichever avenue each young person wants to explore.
“Being around positive people and opportunities, with role models they can relate to and peer leadership, is what it’s all about,” says Daryl. “it’s simply a case of what they want to do. I don’t think we’ve had any person saying they want to be on the street corner selling drugs, so we just make sure we offer a range of options, whether that’s our sporting programme or even signposting them somewhere else to go make music.”
InPower has its roots in founder Daryl’s lived experiences. Having done martial arts as a youngster, in his late teens he swapped the gym for the streets and fell in with a crowd who “weren’t always doing the most productive things”. He got arrested, which proved something of a turning point. With support from his dad, he made “a few personal choices”, got a job, went to university and turned his life around.
After graduating, another arrest – this time, his cousin’s - led to another lightbulb moment. “My cousin’s arrest had been getting him down for weeks, so we just went to the park with a pair of pads and gloves and did some boxing,” remembers Daryl.
“We were there for two hours and by the end we had over 20 mainly young people surrounding us. We had a bit of a session. I remember the essence of how I loved everybody coming together from the community, but I also remember the shift in my cousin’s energy and persona.
“This was a time when a lot of the youth clubs closed. There’s always been price and location barriers to entering martial arts, so I just wanted to remove those barriers. That’s how InPower started.”
That was back in 2012. The InPower Academy opened in 2016 and they now work with up to 250 young people each week - 1,300 individuals in total in 2019. The F.Y.T Clubs run daily with up to 15 participants in each session.
After graduating, another arrest – this time, his cousin’s - led to another lightbulb moment. “My cousin’s arrest had been getting him down for weeks, so we just went to the park with a pair of pads and gloves and did some boxing,” remembers Daryl.
“We were there for two hours and by the end we had over 20 mainly young people surrounding us. We had a bit of a session. I remember the essence of how I loved everybody coming together from the community, but I also remember the shift in my cousin’s energy and persona.
“This was a time when a lot of the youth clubs closed. There’s always been price and location barriers to entering martial arts, so I just wanted to remove those barriers. That’s how InPower started.”
That was back in 2012. The InPower Academy opened in 2016 and they now work with up to 250 young people each week - 1,300 individuals in total in 2019. The F.Y.T Clubs run daily with up to 15 participants in each session.
InPower employs nine staff, with all coaches trained to at least Level 2, plus a Level 2 mentor, a Level 3 project coordinator/youth worker and – a source of understandable pride – an 18-year-old apprentice who is a graduate of the Unbreakables programme and now works in schools as a sports coach and role model.
In Power measures its impact through monitoring attendance, school grades, behaviour and resilience before, during and after the programmes. Daryl says the opportunity to record more detailed impact data with new qualitative metrics through Levelling the Playing Field will be “huge for us”.
Daryl says his ideal outcome for a participant on one of his programmes is for a young person to “change their story”. He adds: “I come from a place very heavy with gang crime. Sometimes we have it harder than others, and we let the environment and voices around us tell us a certain narrative.
“What we try to show (rather than tell) young people is that you can create whatever story you want. It starts with believing that, then making the decision to change, set new goals and start fulfilling their potential.
“If they can really internalise that way of thinking, they will have resilience. They will still get knockbacks in life and for some that might send them spiralling back into a life of crime. But if they’ve done our programme, just because an obstacle has fallen in their way, they know there’s another path they can follow.”
In Power measures its impact through monitoring attendance, school grades, behaviour and resilience before, during and after the programmes. Daryl says the opportunity to record more detailed impact data with new qualitative metrics through Levelling the Playing Field will be “huge for us”.
Daryl says his ideal outcome for a participant on one of his programmes is for a young person to “change their story”. He adds: “I come from a place very heavy with gang crime. Sometimes we have it harder than others, and we let the environment and voices around us tell us a certain narrative.
“What we try to show (rather than tell) young people is that you can create whatever story you want. It starts with believing that, then making the decision to change, set new goals and start fulfilling their potential.
“If they can really internalise that way of thinking, they will have resilience. They will still get knockbacks in life and for some that might send them spiralling back into a life of crime. But if they’ve done our programme, just because an obstacle has fallen in their way, they know there’s another path they can follow.”