East Lothian Council’s Sports Development Team
7 sports specific development officers covering the target sports badminton, basketball, disability sport, football, golf, hockey, rugby and volleyball. The team is led by the Senior Sports Development Officer and have five key areas of work.
School Sport
Supporting Clubs
Coach and Teacher Education
District Squads
Supporting Elite Athletes
The Sports Development Team was established in 1996 when East Lothian Council took the bold and visionary step of publishing its Sports Development Strategy.  The strategy clearly set out how East Lothian Council would develop and promote sport across a number of services.

Pivotal to the delivery of the strategy was the establishment of a sports specific development team under the guidance of a principal officer of sports development.  10 years later and the Sports Development Team continues to be amongst the standard bearers in Scottish Sport. The team have contributed to the formulation of the Healthy Living Service’s strategic plan, Active East Lothian and the team’s impact on individual and team performances can clearly be seen in the report on East Lothian District Squad Success.

Team News

PAiS Launch at Meadowmill
 
East Lothian Council’s Performance Athletes in School (PAiS) programme was launched at Meadowmill Sports Centre on Friday 19 September. 
  

.

The 39 PAiS athletes involved in the programme have been selected from East Lothian’s six secondary schools.
 
The athletes were put through a battery of fitness tests during the induction by sports science lecturers from Edinburgh’s Telford College. Also on hand was Clinical Specialist Physiotherapist, Lindsay Thomson of FASIC at Meadowmill to monitor the athletes’ physical wellbeing.
 
The PAiS programme is an innovative and groundbreaking project that will provide East Lothian athletes with specialised sports coaching, strength and conditioning and athlete support services, before during and after school. 
 
Athletes have been selected in the sports of basketball, hockey, disability sport, football, badminton and rugby.
 
The athletes will be provided with sports specific coaching two times per week at Meadowmill Sports Centre during school time. They will also receive two strength and conditioning sessions, one before school and one after school. Lifestyle workshops will be provided on Friday afternoons at Meadowmill Sports Centre (Nutrition, Injury Prevention, Sports Psychology, Time Management, Lifestyle Management). Friday afternoons will also be used for fitness testing and monitoring and for presentations by guest coaches and athletes.
 
Stephen Duff, East Lothian Council’s Principal Officer – Sports Development commented, “East Lothian has a strong record of producing regional and national players in our target sports. Bringing the best athletes together into district squads has helped bridge the gap between school/club sport and regional/national representation. However, the Sports Development Team had identified that once players had been selected into regional and national squads, they could be supported better locally. Research was carried out gauging pupil and parent desires and expectations and a proposal for local performance athlete support was developed. Today was the start of this new and exciting programme that responds directly to those pupil and parent desires and expectations.”
 
“The collaborative working of schools, sports development and all the other partner agencies has ensured that East Lothian Council is able to provide a quality athlete support programme with the interests of the individual athlete well and truly at the centre.”