Omer is born and bred and raised as a Burngreave man. After growing up on Andover Street with his dad’s shop, he set his heart on wanting to be a worker with young people. Ten years ago, he started working part-time in Darnall, but then came over to Burngreave initially as a careers personal advisor, then as a worker in the Youth Inclusion Project but more recently with the Youth Offending Service. But his recognition tonight is for the part-time detached youth work he does two evenings a week around Pitsmoor and Fir Vale – rarely if ever missing a session.
Go past Fir Vale sports centre on a Thursday evening and you’ll see the footballers turning out. And there’s Omer organising, encouraging, educating, reminding and supporting the youth – not just to play football but to help them start to grow up and become citizens – football but with rules, boundaries and structure.
Perhaps the most impressive testament to Omer is the number of young people who have moved on from being not just footballers on a Thursday, but to becoming the next generation of youth workers themselves. Much talked about – and here’s an example – the sort of role model for all of our young people.