18. Youth

18.1 Safeguarding policy

The Safeguarding policy (Policy #3) is intended to ensure that young players (under 18) are kept safe and are dealt with appropriately. While this policy is primarily the responsibility of the Chairman of the Youth Committee, they will be guided by the BGA’s Child Protection advisor and other Council Members. The Child Protection Advisor is a Council appointment.

18.2 Youth Committee responsibilities

The Youth Committee is responsible for organising BGA Tournaments and events specifically aimed at young players. Currently (February 2020) these consist of:-

1. British Youth Go Championships, normally held over one day in the Autumn conveniently located for the majority of Youth members. In practice this generally means within 30 miles of Birmingham.
2. The Youth Go Camp, normally held over 3 days at a residential outdoor activity centre.
3. The UK Go Challenge Finals, generally held over 1 day at a location convenient for a large number of young players. As this consists of 13x13 games it can be combined with the British Small Board Championships.
4. The Youth online international league. This generally consists of around 5 matches played on KGS over 5 Saturdays in the winter.

The Committee is also responsible for facilitating Youth entries to European and World events, especially the European Youth Go Congress.

18.3 Budgets

The Youth Committee shall agree an annual budget with the Treasurer within 60 days of the AGM.

18.4 Support for School Clubs

It is recognised that school budgets are often very stretched, and that there can be significant bureaucracy involved in Schools purchasing equipment. The Youth Committee shall therefore be reasonably liberal in providing cheap equipment, particularly for start-ups (“Durham” sets and “Take away Go sets”.

Sometimes BGA members help out at school clubs, entailing travelling expenses. The Youth Committee will consider covering these expenses, but only in the event that the school is unable (or unwilling) to.

18.5 Youth Financial Policies

It is recognised that it is not always feasible for Youth events to run on a break even basis, and sometimes they will be deliberately run on a loss-making basis. Nevertheless the following principles to running and financing events shall apply:

1. Events shall rarely be “free” (unless there is actually a zero cost, such as the Internet team championships) – the principle being that people appreciate things more if they have some “skin in the game”
2. Players are generally expected to pay for their own travel, subsistence and accommodation
3. Other costs – prizes, organisers’ expenses, room hire, etc. will be treated on a case-by-case basis.

18.6 Youth Go Trust

The Youth Committee will be responsible for liaison with the Youth Go Trust