The Derby County in the Community scheme operates from the Derby County Training Ground at Moor Farm, Morley Road, Oakwood, Derby.

The scheme delivers its core programme throughout Derbyshire in schools as far north of the county as Hayfield and in the south as far as Coton in the Elms.

To ensure that community activity is locally based, the scheme appointed four regional school development officers in January 2007.

DCITC staff currently engages with 1,000 schoolchildren each week and during 2008 delivered sessions in education and football in over 300 schools.

The strength of the scheme is its reputation for excellence and quality that has been developed since its inception in 1999.

Constant monitoring and evaluation of the delivery programmes is undertaken to ensure that all activities remain of the highest standard.

The scheme continues to evolve and ensures that its delivery programme is innovative and cutting edge.

The standards of the scheme have been acknowledged both regionally and nationally.

The scheme was awarded the national FA Charter Standard Award for Excellence in 2005/06 and was short listed for the Derbyshire Business Awards in 2006.

A major success for the scheme has been winning the Business Commitment to the Community Award in the 2009 Business Awards Derbyshire.

This award recognises our commitment to the local community we serve and highlights the high standards we set within our scheme for engagement and delivery.

We acknowledge that the benefits of sport go well beyond the skills young people learn and practice on the field.

Our ethos is to teach people life skills for use beyond the playing field to assist in building and enhancing communities.

Here are some examples of the type of work that is undertaken by DCITC:

In 2007 we were given the Partnership Innovation Award for Derbyshire for our work with the Prince's Trust in respect of our commitment to improving the career opportunities, hopes and aspirations of young people.

We have successfully accessed a significant sum of funding to run two Kickz social inclusion programmes in conjunction with the Premier League, Football Foundation, Derbyshire Constabulary, Sporting Futures and Derby City Council in two focus areas of the city.

The project works with referred young adults and helps to reduce crime, disorder and anti-social behaviour as well as educating disaffected young adults in life skills.

Through crime pattern analysis it is shown that there is a significant decrease in the level of criminality in areas where and when such sessions are held.

During the 2007/08 season we were heavily involved with the Premier League Creating Chances initiative. The programme enabled DCITC and DCFC to raise and allocate £46,000 to local charities.

On December 14 2007 as part of the programme Rams player Lee Holmes flew to Lapland with the Wish Upon a Star charity to meet Santa with 100 terminally ill children.

Each year the club has nominated ten designated charities with whom we work to raise funds.

The charity year ends with a summer ball in July at Pride Park and during 2007-08 the club raised £50,000 for extremely worthy causes.

On July 30 2007, Derby County hosted the inaugural Brian Clough Trophy match against Nottingham Forest.

A sum of £100,000 was raised for charity from the gate receipts. Among the organisations that have benefited from this game so far are the County Air Ambulance, the NSPCC and a number of other local causes.

The club provides, at no cost, a study support centre within the stadium which is used as part of an after school programme by local children aged from ten to 14.

They are taught how to improve their IT, literacy and numeracy skills. The same facility is used at weekends for a computer club for girls which, due to its success, was visited in December 2007 by the Rt Hon Margaret Beckett MP.

One of our young coaches was selected in 2008 as one of only two girls from England and Wales to represent the Football Association in Malawi where she helped deliver a coaching programme to young Africans, many of whom are affected by HIV and AIDS.

Derby County are one of the very few clubs in the country that has its own mental health football team.

The group train weekly and, wearing club colours, represent Derby County at regional and national festivals.

The overall success of the players this season was rewarded when they were rewarded by being short listed for the team of the year in the Derby City Council Sports Awards.

The work we have undertaken within this programme has resulted in a letter of commendation being received by the club from the Derbyshire Mental Health Trust.

Richard Astle, our Hat-trick officer, recently spent a week in Israel supporting the national Football for Peace Programme.

After a training programme in Cologne, Richard flew to Israel to work with local community groups with the aim of increasing community cohesion particularly with young people from the Palestinian and Jewish communities.

In 2007 Derby County Football Club worked with Derby City Council and the Barclays Spaces for Sport team to install at a cost of £500,000 an artificial turf pitch at the Racecourse.

The Steve Bloomer Pitch is available for community usage throughout the day and at evenings seven days a week.

An application has been submitted for additional funds which if successful will enable the building of changing facilities and club house with the car parking on site also being developed.

The club has been successful in an application to secure funding from the Premier League/PFA community fund to enable our staff to deliver a programme primarily focused on raising physical activity levels of young females aged 11-16 in Derby.

The three year programme costing in excess of £500,000 was launched in September 2008 with the appointments of project manager Sharon Dale and project officer Arron Winfield.

DCITC has on behalf of Derby County Football Club successfully achieved the Preliminary Racial Equality Standard for professional football clubs issued by Kick Racism out of Football programme and the Racial Equality Council.

Derby County Football Club is committed to utlising its players to engage with local communities and add value to the programmes being delivered by the DCITC programme.

At a recent Show Racism the Red Card event held at Pride Park Stadium, first team players Jordan Stewart and Paul Green were on hand to answer questions form the 120 young people in the audience on racism in football as well as staying to sign squad photos and programmes to send everyone home happy.

Through the club's Hat-trick project based in the Derwent ward of the city, previously disaffected local residents have enjoyed full-time work delivering football coaching courses in that area.

Over 40 other residents have been supported to attain a number of different qualifications, which has enabled the club to provide an infrastructure that now supports two local football teams.

DCITC manages and administers the Young Rams membership scheme, which currently boasts a membership of over 2,000 boys and girls.