After many years of great, fun community skateboarding events in Moira Shire, it was special to be able to finally up-skill some of the loyal participants of previous years. Josh Harvie and Brent Setford have skated in the All Aboard program for years. Really genuine young men who are welcoming and inclusive to anyone who show up at the skate park. The skate park shouldn’t be intimidating, and these guys unknowingly put a lot of smiles on people’s faces as they skated and interacted with the communities of Moira, particularly Numurkah. Brent would do a backflip for the crowd every year, even helping to make badges for the young ones. Rachel Delphin and I felt the warmth of the community when these individuals were present at the skate park. This project finally allowed VSA to formalise the mentor-student relationship that is omnipresent at skate parks. The Moira Skateboarding Curriculum aimed to train and up-skill three (3) Moira residents to become skateboarding coaches, accredited by Skate Australia.
It is our goal to have an independent Goulburn Valley team and store the gear locally. The VSA also helped fund and coordinate a school All Aboard Session at Strathmerton Primary, and the Skate Park League integration with the North East Series, including a community bus coming from Wodonga, thanks Al’s Skate Co. See below media. Overall, the project created 100 unique participation opportunities 56 parents / guardians / spectators looking on for a total of 156 event attendees. 66 participants were male and 34 were female, meaning 34% were female participation. We had 31 unique participants per-register, of these 12 were female, and 2 identified as Aboriginal or Torres Strait Islanders. We also had external park users who benefited from the social interactions of the sessions, making new users feel at home. Here are some highlights…
Yarrawonga in the fog.
Numurkah by the river.
Strathmerton the hidden gem.
The flyer for the Train the Trainer session, well delayed due to the lockdowns…
The current generation of All Aboard marketing, championing the female involvement.
Josh Harvie, our coach in training turned certified Y Skate Coach and Program Officer, working out at Wallan and getting to travel the state to spread skateboarding awesomeness.
And big thanks to Al’s Skate Co for organising the bus to Cobram…
The VSA – Board members Richard Flude and Rachel Delphin – have a very long history with the special Shire. Here are some of the archives…
The opening of Cobram skate park, Skateboarding Australia days…
The Convic park design
The original Murray Hub, 2013…
SbA Hubs program, 2014…
Matt Billings, Shepparton based coach giving out the Brett Royden board.
And then the Ownlife generation of events, where we got to organise and facilitate the events for years…
And then came along VSA, where we started the All Aboard program. We are so grateful to Moira Shire, the VSA Board, and YMCA Victoria for helping us keep the dream alive in places like Moira, country Victoria. We are so close to finally been able to have skate coaches in these regions operate independently of metropolitan visits, with the schools and nearby areas having access to resources for continuous programming. Let’s see what 2023 brings for the Gourburn Valley…
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