FC Emmen Naoberschap inside wins Cedris Waarderingsprijs

FC Emmen Naoberschap inside wins Cedris Waarderingsprijs

The project ‘Naoberschap Inside’ of FC Emmen Naoberschap, the social branch of the club, has won the Cedris Appreciation Prize. This annual award rewards special initiatives that work in an innovative way to help people with a distance to the labour market find work. The jury, led by Job Cohen, was so impressed by the project of FC Emmen and a project of WerkSaam Westfriesland, that it decided to appoint not one, but two winners this year.

The two winners were chosen from fifty entries. “They are all wonderful initiatives that contribute to a more inclusive labour market,” said Job Cohen. “But these projects really stood out. We found it so difficult to make a choice, that we decided to select two winners.” Presenter Marcel Bamberg therefore travelled to Hoorn and Emmen to surprise the winners at their workplace. There they were presented with the Appreciation Award and a cheque for 2,500 euros.

FC Emmen Naoberschap, the social branch of the club, also reacted enthusiastically to the win. In the project ‘Naoberschap Inside’, detainees from the Penitentiary Institution (PI) Veenhuizen, who are in the final phase of their sentence, are guided towards a place on the labour market. They play sports together and make active use of the 11 core values of the football club, such as discipline, ambition and trust. The FC Emmen business network is used to offer workplaces. “The results of your project show that it is a successful concept: ten ex-offenders have found a job through the network of FC Emmen,” the jury said. “And it’s about more than just labour participation: participants can reintegrate into society in a good way thanks to the project. That contributes to bridging social prejudices.”

“This award shows that we are on the right track enormously,” says project manager Marcel Sulmann of FC Emmen. “We can only move forward now and we are very happy with that. The money is a great incentive to further expand the project and continue on this path.”

Jan-Roelof van der Spoel of the PI in Veenhuizen emphasises the importance of the project. “We try to ensure in all kinds of ways that imprisonment also contributes to giving life a different turn. That it leads to a crime-free existence. We cannot do this alone, we need chain partners such as FC Emmen.”

The club was also part of this year’s Football Works Festival. EFDN and the ‘Dienst Justitiële Inrichtingen’ have joined forces to organise an event that not only includes a tournament but also a conference that brings together practitioners from the various best practice programmes from across Europe. One of the main objectives is to inspire professional and amateur football clubs to create their own programmes for a target group that is traditionally difficult to reach. The annual Football Works Festival is a platform for football clubs, social organisations and prisons from across Europe that offer work placement programmes.