Enderby Lawn Tennis Club: "We saw there was a gap in giving back to the community."

There is something for everyone at Dawn Williams’ tennis sessions at Enderby Lawn Tennis Club.

Twice a week, the club puts on specific sessions for local students with learning, emotional or behavioural disabilities with the aim to simply get people moving.

That means tennis skills are at the bottom of the list of priorities for those taking the court, with the sessions instead designed to help build confidence and resilience.

“It makes absolutely no difference whether you can play tennis or not,” said Dawn, who has been recognised with a nomination for the Outstanding Individual Achievement Award at the Variety Disability Sports Awards.

“It’s more to get people active. It may be that they might be the only adult we see in the week other than the sessions so we chat to them on the way around, what they’ve been doing in the week.

“They might have to sit down; any physical problems they might have but we can tailor that where we’ve got the session.

“We do some exercises, balance exercises, mobility exercises to get them going. And then we do various activities because they have quite a range of abilities.

“We try and tailor it to each session that we’ve got. We can sometimes get them hitting it over the net.

“Someone takes the lead. It’s really good for their communication and their teamwork.”

Meeting a need

Dawn initially set up the sessions upon wanting to ensure the tennis club gave something back to the community.

It soon developed into the current project, which sees the club team up with a local special educational needs school and an adult learning establishment next door.

“When I retired six years ago, I thought I’d put something back and I was secretary for three years. In that time we could see there was a gap in giving back to the community.

“We liaised with the adult learners college, they give health and wellbeing groups and part of their health and wellbeing course is to come for an hour on the days they come to the college.

“It’s a really good session for them and it’s made huge benefits. The feedback we’ve had from the school has been amazing, about their behaviour, their activity levels.

“They have a variety of problems they have to conquer on a daily basis and they always feel they never had a chance to have coaching sessions like other children. This has given them a huge amount of confidence and a boost in their schoolwork.”

Changing lives through tennis

The sessions have also had a transformative impact on the regular tennis players at the club, with a number getting involved to volunteer alongside Dawn to make sure they run smoothly.

She added: “You get an awful amount of joy when somebody who is nonverbal suddenly says somebody’s name or something like that. It’s a big thing.

“The adult learners always run an end of term assembly or celebration of learning so we were invited to their Christmas assembly and it was just lovely for us to see what they do and what they can give us back.”