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Funding Round

Changing Lives through Sport and Physical Activity Fund

Various
Grantholder

The Changing Lives through Sport and Physical Activity Fund was delivered by Spirit of 2012 on behalf of the Changing Lives Partnership. The Fund sat within the wider Changing Lives through Sport and Physical Activity Programme and involved changing lives partners Scottish Government, sportscotland, The Robertson Trust and Spirit of 2012.

Project information

£1,016,856

Grant amount

August 2018

Date awarded

January 2019 – October 2021

Project duration

Scotland

Location

Download the Fund Evaluation Full Report Download the Fund Evaluation Exec Sum

Project Detail

Project summary

In 2018 Spirit of 2012, sportscotland, the Scottish Government and The Robertson Trust came together to form the Changing Lives through Sport and Physical Activity Partnership (Changing Lives) .

Changing Lives is a way of working to intentionally bring about positive change for people and communities using sporting sport and physical activity as a mechanism.

The partnership delivered a programme of funding, learning and workforce development to embed the Changing Lives in the Scottish sporting system.

Changing Lives included a £1 million grant fund, which supported 17 sporting and non-sporting partnerships across Scotland to intentionally use sport and physical activity in creative and fun ways to tackle important challenges like isolation, health & wellbeing, and skills development. Originally intended to run between January 2019 and December 2020, several projects extended and changed their activities due to the pandemic.

The Fund supported a wide variety of partnerships: from care homes and walking groups, to Street Soccer and prisons, to substance abuse rehabilitation charities and leisure centres. Partnerships were often between organisations with different specialisms, often with existing trusting relationships with specific communities. Some grantees intended to adapt and roll out an existing high-quality programme to an underrepresented group, others were trying something completely new. All were seeking to achieve broader social outcomes – from employability, to improved mental health, to reduced isolation – alongside physical activity increases. A summary of the grants is given in the table below.

Beyond the Fund, Changing Lives has also focused on workforce development and instilling a ‘test and learn’ culture across physical activity provision in Scotland. Changing Lives absorbed the Thrive Learning Programme, evaluation and project design training for sports practitioners originally developed as part of Legacy 2014. Thrive continued to be developed and delivered by Actify and Evaluation Support Scotland. As of 2025, a wide range of free resources are available on Actify, as well as a free self-directed online learning course and a certified in-person training course.

Impact & Learning

Key achievements

  •  Projects such as Centre Forward (Forth Valley College) and Youth Work through Sport (Youth Scotland) led to adults and young people gaining formal qualifications
  • From a 90-year-old who regained the ability to tie his shoelaces (Replay Sport Memories) to a shy refugee boy taking a leadership role at a National Cricket Camp (Wicketz), to a former prisoner attending football to connect with others and re-establish his routines (Positive Change), there were scores of highly varied individual stories and achievements behind the grants.

Key learnings

  • Strong partnerships: Collaboration between sports, community, and health organisations was vital, combining different strengths to reach more people.
  • Linking capital and trust: Taking a Changing Lives approach means that sports organisations become a source of ‘linking’ social capital – strengthening links between people and institutions. This was particularly clear during COVID-19, were organisations working with low-income families found they were a key provider of food parcels and navigating council support.
  • Space to learn and adapt: Not all activities worked straight away, and this requires honest, trusted conversations between funders and grant-holders, using judgement about when to pivot to a different approach, and keeping a clear, reflective record of what worked and why.
  • Key ingredients for success included: building in time for the social aspects of the activity, providing routes for participants to influence the activities and prioritising depth of engagement over a sustained period, rather than high numbers of participants.

Changing Lives through Sport and Physical Activity was about more than fitness. It was about creating opportunities and proving that activity can help unlock potential for everyone.

2,860

people

Over 2,860 people took part in regular activities as part of the Changing Lives Fund

10,300

people

More than 10,300 people joined taster sessions and community events.

79%

of participants

said the project helped them to feel closer to people [n = 151], 82% said the project helped them feel relaxed [n = 126]; and 75% said it helped them feel optimistic [n = 161]

Project Detail

The Changing Lives Fund: A summary of grants

  Project Partners (Grantholder listed first)   Grant Award   What they did
ActivAGEGreenock Morton Community Trust/ CVS Inverclyde£57,000Designed to work with older people in care home settings, during the pandemic (with direct access prohibited) the Community Trust shifted to producing resources and providing equipment to support care home residents to be active during lockdown.
Active FamiliesSport Aberdeen/ Action for Children£69,782This project worked with families with complex needs. During lockdown, it delivered online workouts including a Fortnite dance class. From summer 2020, it supported families to understand what was available in their local area, organising gym inductions and visits to local trampoline park, climbing walls and other active outdoor spaces.
Care About WalkingPaths for All/ Perth and Kinross Council£50,000Paths for All provided training for care home staff about how walking-based activities could be integrated more into residents’ lives to increase activity levels, including through design of the space. Restricted access during COVID meant the project team shifted more towards producing resources, as well as improving attractiveness of outdoor areas.
Care 2B ActiveActive Communities/ Who Cares? Scotland£69,985This project worked with 240 care-experienced young people to find out what they wanted from physical activity settings and used this to provide advice and training to those settings about trauma-informed practice. It supported this group to engage in a wide range of activities with a particular focus on removing cost and transport barriers to participation, as well as creating a safe space for the young people to be active together in a stigma-free environment, with access to a holistic therapist alongside activity sessions.
Centre ForwardForth Valley College/ Falkirk Football Community Foundation£51,600This project supported 20 young people with learning disabilities to gain a SQA accreditation, taking a mix of employability and physical activity leadership units alongside Scottish Football Association coaching qualifications.  By the end of the project, 7 students had gone on to employment, 9 further training and 5 were continuing to volunteer.
Champions for ChangeNorth Ayrshire Leisure/ North Ayrshire Drug and Alcohol Partnership£69,600This project delivered physical activity sessions in primary schools, alongside messages about the dangers of drug and alcohol misuse. It also worked directly with people with mental health and/or addition issues to become more physically active.
Community StridesScottish Association for Mental Health (SAMH) / jogscotland£69,787This project worked with 129 minority-ethnic women in Dundee, Edinburgh, Aberdeen and Glasgow to understand and reduce barriers to physical activity, initially through group jogging sessions and then during the pandemic a mix of online and outdoor activities.
Inclusion through ActivityActive Stirling/ Change, Grow, Live£42,151This project worked with people with addition and alcohol misuse issues, supporting them to be more active. Significantly impacted by COVID restrictions and furlough, the project team primarily worked on a 1.1. basis with 31 participants, through climbing, swimming, gym and other activities.
Inspiring Cadder!Achieve More Scotland/ YOMO£64,160This project worked with children and families from an area of high socio-economic deprivation in Cadder, outside of Glasgow, providing a range of fun, free activities. During the pandemic, the delivery team provided food parcels to the families. In summer 2020 they provided 6 weeks’ of daily physical activity sessions, alongside breakfast and a hot lunch.
Let’s Give Sport Back to GirlsInch Park Community Sport Hub/ Youth Scotland£66,218Reaching almost 600 girls, this project explored ways of getting girls with low levels of physical activity participation more active. Initially planning on introducing new girls into major sports like rugby, football and cricket, the project shifted to more generalised physical activity based on the preferences and ideas of the girls themselves.
Positive Change through Football: Inside and OutStreet Soccer Scotland/ Shelter Scotland/ APEX Scotland£53,761Initially delivering physical activity sessions within four prisons, following COVID restrictions, the project shifted to working with people who had been released from prison, first through 1.1 sessions and then through group football. Some participants who had attending sessions whilst in prison were able to transition to attending community drop-in sessions after their release.
Replay Sporting MemoriesSporting Memories Foundation/ Calderglen Community Sport Hub/ South Lanarkshire Leisure£69,871The Replay Sporting Memories project aimed to support older people to improve strength and balance. It provided a KIT bag of equipment, in 2020/21, to enable people to exercise at home.
Shining a Light on mental health: by young people for young people (BYP4YP)Scottish Sports Futures (SSF)/ Scottish Association for Mental Health (SAMH)£61,205This project supported 20 young people to become Wellbeing Ambassadors, leading conversations about mental health with their peers and other adults. C2800 people attended workshops and activities led by the young ambassadors over the course of the project. Scottish Sports Futures staff reported that they were more confident to have conversations about mental health with young people following the project.
Together Equality Achieves More (T.E.A.M)Big Hearts Community Trust/ Multi Cultural Family Base£47,772Pre-pandemic, the project ran weekly activity sessions for a group of c30 children in Edinburgh. During the COVID lockdowns, TEAM switched to providing the families with support, including food parcels and access to grants.
Walking Netball – More than a gameNetball Scotland/ Age Scotland/ Breathing Space£54,003545 women engaged in regular walking netball as part of this project, which supported them to increase their activity levels as well as stay connected and make new friends.
WicketzLords Taverners/ Cricket Scotland£50,000More than 1500 young people got involved in cricket taster sessions, and 155 took part regularly before and after COVID lockdown. This project was particularly aimed at young people from ethnic minority backgrounds, and young refugees and migrants. The emphasis was on creating a “family” feel
Youth Work through SportYouth Scotland/ St Angela’s Participation Centre Community Sport Hub/ North Kelvin Sports Development Group£69,960Both adults and young people worked towards qualifications through sport in this project, with 76 young people achieving SCQF Level 2 or 3 qualifications alongside 4 adults achieving their PDA in Youth Work.

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