Medway Badminton Association is an active part of the Medway community, and an ambassador for the sport of badminton in Kent.
It was a requirement of the funding Medway Badminton Association Limited received from Sport England, to update the facilities of the club, that development of badminton would take place both to occupy more court hours and to develop badminton into the community.
In 2005 Medway Junior Badminton achieved Silver Club status, now ‘Premier Club status.’ This involves ‘playing the game’, administration, management, child protection and safety. We were one of the first junior badminton clubs in the country to receive this award.
On the 3rd October 2006 Medway Badminton achieved their status ‘Performance and Development Centre.’ The development officer attends meetings with;
- Medway Community Sports Network, all the Clubmark clubs in Medway
- Medway Sports Development Team
- Medway Exercise Referral Service
- NHS Medway, Medway’s Obesity Network, obesity being a growing problem in Medway
- The MEND Scheme/Tipping the Balance Scheme/Connect Well Medway
- Medway Council schools PE meetings
- Badminton England
- The PACT group
We encourage students from Mid Kent College to help officiate at the Badminton England School Games (Secondary schools). This helps to boost their confidence in the community. 2014 saw the largest school entry for the first round of the games. Funding for the school games has been passed down to the Counties. This coming year round one/two will be set for November 2019, with a provisional date for round three in February 2020.
Hilary spent a morning at Swingate Primary School in 2018, to give the pupils taster sessions of badminton. It was very much enjoyed by all. Working with The Howard School, Medway Junior Badminton is involved in an annual ‘Rackets Festival’. This festival is for children in school years 3 and 4. Several schools take part, encouraging all the young players to play four racket sports (i.e. badminton, table tennis, tennis and squash).
Working with Medway Council, Medway Junior Badminton assist with the Medway Mini Youth Games. We also provide volunteers to help on the day. In November 2018 43 primary school teams took part in the games.
Tipping The Balance badminton sessions are on Tuesday mornings from 10am – 11.30am. The NHS hold ‘Tipping the Balance’ sessions in our meeting room.