Having signed up as a community coach with Netball Victoria, Carter took the next step by getting involved at the ground level and has run several programs over the past two terms at schools around Melbourne.
The Sporting Schools program, introduced by the Australian Sports Commission this year, aims to get more children engaged in sport-based activity within the school environment.
Carter said that introducing students from different countries and cultural backgrounds to netball through the program and ANZ NetSetGO was very rewarding.
She said watching them adapt to the sport over the four-week course was impressive and also a lot of fun for the students.
“My best experience with Sporting Schools was feedback from a teacher about two weeks after a four-week clinic had ended and Netball Victoria ran a come-and-try day,” Carter said.
“The teacher told me about a boy from this school that participated in the lunch time clinics that I was running who would repeatedly ask when I was coming back and when they could do netball again.
“He also said that this boy sat by himself every lunch time and that the netball clinic had given him purpose and helped him socialise with other children.”
The schools embraced the program and the students enjoyed learning new skills each session.
“One teacher said to me that they had never seen anyone teach kids to pass a ball properly,” Carter said.
“The staff at the schools were fantastic. They are very positive about the program and happy to get in someone who knows the sport to teach the kids skills.”
“For some schools, netball is an inter-school sport and those schools were happy to get a bit of up skilling. Those who were learning netball for the first time were happy because it was getting the kids out and actively involved in sport.
“I have explained to students that sport – netball in particular – is a great way to stay healthy and make life-long friends. Netball is great for socialising and it doesn’t always have to be competitive as there are many levels available for everyone to play.”
