College Footy Shirts Find New Home in Africa

Old football shirts and sports kits are being donated to local Bradford charity and Bradford City AFC’s community partner ‘One in a Million’, as part of a recycling initiative at the new Leeds City College.

Over 100 shirts and tops branded with logos from the three merging institutions (Leeds Thomas Danby, Leeds College of Technology and Park Lane College Leeds & Keighley) have been donated by the Sports departments and students’ unions of the new college campuses.

The shirts will now be taken to Kerugoya in Kenya where ‘One in a Million’ sponsor children who live below the social and economic poverty line and have little sports clothing.

The donation of sports kits is one part of a large-scale recycling initiative feeding into the forthcoming Summer campaign to launch the new Leeds City College.

Over the course of six weeks, old materials or merchandise branded with old college logos is being collected by the ‘Big Dump’ recycling squad, who are visiting every college site including the Technology, Thomas Danby, Park Lane and Keighley Campuses.

In the last three weeks, the recycling squad has already successfully recycled over 2.5 tonnes of material (equivalent to 70 dump bins), with further visits planned to offices and storerooms at approximately 25 other college sites across Leeds.

The College hopes to maintain a zero-landfill target through the recycling campaign. All old materials will either be re-used or recycled.

Wayne Jacobs (Co-founder of ‘One in a Million’ and assistant manager of Bradford City AFC ) said:

“We’re really grateful for these donations. It’s great that something positive can come out of getting rid of old merchandise which, as a by-product of this merger, would otherwise go in the bin. The old football kits are an example of how something which would ordinarily be thrown away can be put to great use elsewhere.”

Further Information

The ‘Big Dump’ Campaign
Since June 2008, the company Ware 4 have worked with Park Lane College Leeds & Keighley to provide recycling facilities across several sites. Through this latest joint initiative, everything collected from the College is to be recycled, most of which is carried out in Yorkshire.

Paper and plastic materials have been sent to Leeds Paper Recycling in Pudsey; textiles, lanyards, keyrings, and banners have been sent to recycling company Why Waste, for distribution to places including ‘The Scrapstore’, adventure playgrounds, and other community projects. The College is also donating white branded paper to Why Waste and Education Leeds to be made into recycled notebooks.

The Leeds City College Merger
The vision of Leeds City College became a reality on 1 April 2009, with the merger of Leeds College of Technology, Leeds Thomas Danby and Park Lane College Leeds & Keighley. The three organisations have come together to build a new college of excellence for the city, with the aim of enhancing the range of courses on offer, improving learning and teaching facilities to be among the best in the country, and raising achievement levels in Leeds. To find out the latest information on the merger, please visit: www.theleedscollegemerger.co.uk

One in a Million
The charity, One in a Million, has a mission to improve the lives of young people across Bradford. This sports project encourages children and younger people to appreciate how valuable they are and empowers them to reach their full potential. One in a Million is currently impacting over 700 children and young people’s lives on a weekly basis, the majority of whom live in areas of deprivation. They earnestly believe that every child matters; every child is one in a million.

Leeds City College Being Green.

Press Contact
Kathy Sharpe
Marketing & PR Coordinator
Leeds City College
t: 0113 216 2561
e: katherine.sharpe@leedscitycollege.ac.uk