MORE than 1,000 children have benefited from Sylvia Harrison’s badminton coaching.
Her dedication to St Ninian’s Junior Badminton Club, which she has stepped down from running after more than 20 years, has seen her being nominated in Isle of Man Newspapers’ Pride in Mann Awards.
Sylvia, aged 70, of Willowbrook Gardens, in Douglas, was nominated in the Volunteer of the Year category of the Flybe-sponsored awards by her daughter Susanne Domingo.
Susanne, of Ashberry Avenue, in Douglas, has taken over the running of the club although her mum is still on the reserve list of coaches.
There is a heavy family involvement in the club on Sunday afternoons in St Ninian’s High School’s sports hall.
Two of its founding members in 1931 were her parents. One of her grandchildren plays with the junior club, and the other three play for the senior club.
In addition, all of her three children have played for the county team.
When Sylvia took over the running of the club in the 1980s she changed its location from the former St Ninian’s Church hall, and changed the day it met.
‘It went from strength to strength from there,’ she said. ‘It built up to 70 members.’
The six- to 15 year-olds are now split into two different sessions.
She said the club’s ‘star pupil’ over the years was Josh Green, who plays for England.
‘He started out at one of our “Come and try it” sessions and it went from there,’ she said. As well as the social side of the club, she said badminton helped develop children’s hand-eye co-ordination, was a good form of exercise and teaches players sportsmanship.
Sylvia said: ‘I see a lot of happy faces and see them progress. I have always really enjoyed the sport and I played for a long time.’ But she said she moved on to the coaching side of the game because she didn’t think she was very talented.
Sylvia described being nominated as a ‘big surprise’, saying: ‘I’m very honoured.’
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Pride in Mann is an awards scheme from Isle of Man Newspapers and Flybe which aims to recognise unsung heroes in the Manx community.
The competition sees the public invited to nominate people they feel are worthy recipients of an award across 10 categories. Each person nominated will be recognised in one of our newspapers and later there will be a public vote to find the categories’ winners.
The categories for this year’s Pride in Mann awards are: Promotion of Manx Culture, Performer of the Year, Teacher of the Year, Sporting Acheivement, Young Person of the Year, Volunteer of the Year, Linking with Schools, Customer Service and Family Business.
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Who will you nominate?
You can find a downloadable nomination form by clicking {http://www.iomtoday.co.im/news/isle-of-man-news/pride_in_mann_1_4040786|this link.}