A Highland Active Schools Coordinator has received national recognition after helping children in some of Scotland’s most remote communities discover TaeKwon Do.
Pamela Macdonald, High Life Highland’s Active Schools Coordinator for the Mallaig cluster, has received an Unsung Hero Award from TaeKwon Do Council UK.
The award recognises people who may not participate in TaeKwon Do conventionally but work behind the scenes to make the sport accessible to others.
For Pamela, that has meant finding ways around the considerable geographical challenges of providing activities for children in Mallaig and surrounding communities.
Her work stretches to pupils on Muck, Eigg and Rum as well as the Knoydart peninsula, where simply getting children and an instructor into the same room is not always straightforward.
One solution has been online TaeKwon Do sessions delivered with Inverness based TaeKwon Do Master Claire Crosbie.
The sessions have allowed children in remote communities to train regularly, with a number progressing to formal gradings.
The partnership between Pamela and Claire dates back to 2013, when Pamela invited her to Eigg to teach children during an activities day.
Claire said:
“Pam has been so integral in making TaeKwon-Do accessible to such remote areas and we are so grateful for everything she has done and supporting what we do.
“I first met Pam back in 2013 when she invited me to Eigg to take part in an activities day and teach the lovely school kids.
“Since then, Pam kept in touch and I would accept invitations to various events and activities of similar ilk.
“Then, in 2022, after another lovely invitation to come to Mallaig to teach, we put our heads together and came up with something a bit more permanent. And so began the classes in Mallaig and Arisaig.
“It was Pam’s ingenuity that also helped bring the online classes to life.
“This helped those in the most rural areas of Scotland have access to the TaeKwon Do classes I provide.
“In that time, we have trained the school kids on Eigg, Rum, Muck and Inverie.
“Pam has also done amazing work to promote what we do to other Active Schools coordinators, giving others in the same position an opportunity to give our classes a try.”
Pamela has now spent more than 20 years as Active Schools Coordinator for the Mallaig cluster.
She said:
“I am incredibly honoured and humbled to receive TaeKwon Do’s Unsung Hero award.
“It is truly a privilege to work with Claire, the children and young people in the Mallaig and Small isles clusters and with TaeKwon Do’s national governing body.
“The online TaeKwon Do sessions with Claire Crosbie have been fantastic and really captured the imagination of those taking part.
“One of my proudest moments was seeing the children receive their yellow belts!”
