History

In 2006 the Walcountian Blues Lacrosse club was working with the London Borough of Croydon to employ a teacher in a local school partnership to teach lacrosse across the schools in the partnership. The cost of employing the teacher was largely met by Croydon but the Blues needed to raise a substantial sum to get the project off the ground. To assist fund raising Rob Collinge created the South of England Lacrosse Educational Trust (SELET) and registered the trust as a charity.

In those days promoting taking part in sport was not considered ‘charitable’ by law. SELET was an educational trust with an objective to teach people about the sport. In April 2008 the law changed and the promotion of healthy sports became charitable. Within days of the change SELET broadened its objectives to include supporting the wider aspects of the sport of lacrosse.

Over its first ten years SELET operated as a small charity raising some £135,000.

In September 2016, Roger Okill, a long time supporter of SELET and lacrosse, died leaving a generous legacy to the trust. There followed a period of re-organisation for the trust to meet the governance needs of the larger trust – new trustees, a revision to the trust deed to broaden its objectives, establishing robust management processes and the winding up of Roger’s estate.

A new organisation was born, building on the history as an educational trust. The Lacrosse Foundation was launched in September 2018 to use our resources and the charitable status to grow the game of lacrosse in Great Britain.