GAA is not just a sports umbrella, it is a community organisation

It was great to see Cork GAA organise, promote and deliver its first workshop on creating a healthy club off the pitch. It is a widely misconceived notion that the GAA is a sports organisation but it is actually a community organisation, the country’s largest may I add, hence the importance of holding such an event.

The GAA must play to its strengths in areas like community effort, volunteering, health promotion, mental wellbeing and life skills.

By their very nature, a GAA club delivers health qualities and opportunities — the physical benefits of playing and training, the social connections, life skills such as communication and self-efficacy, a safe place to socialise, inter-generational interaction.