They Thought We'd Teach Kids To Fight. We Taught Them To Turn Up
A few years ago, the word “boxing” could stall a conversation with a school before it had properly started. This year, Training Cave became an approved alternative provision with Kirklees local authority. In between, young people who had stopped going to school started arriving early. Young people written off as “trouble” earned qualifications, went to college and got jobs. This is the story of how that happened, and why I think boxing has been misunderstood for a long time.
The look on people’s faces
When we started Training Cave, I lost count of how many times I watched someone’s face change when I said the word “boxing.”
You could see what they were picturing: fights, aggression, kids learning to hurt each other. It wasn’t the picture in my head, but I understood why it was in theirs.
We had schools that weren’t sure about us. We had councils that weren’t sure about us. And honestly? That was fair.
These are people responsible for young people, often young people who have already had a rough ride. Some have been excluded. Some have stopped turning up. Some have been let down by adults before. Nobody should hand those young people over to an organisation just because it says the right things in a meeting.
So we didn’t ask anyone to take our word for it. We set out to earn it.
What earning it actually looked like
There was no big moment. It was a lot of small, ordinary ones, repeated week after week.
It looked like standards from the first session: be on time, shake hands, listen when a coach is talking, look after the kit and look after each other. The same expectations every time, whoever you are and whatever has gone on before you walked in.
It looked like coaches who keep turning up for young people who are used to adults giving up on them.
And it looked like being honest with schools about what we could do and what we couldn’t.
What the numbers say now
Fast forward to today, and we work across more than 20 schools, colleges and pupil referral units. We’ve reached around 1,744 young people through our education work.
In 2025, our work generated £455,184 in social value, which works out at around £3.84 for every £1 invested. Young people on our programmes told us their self-belief rose by an average of 252%. And every partner we asked said they would recommend us.
I’m careful with numbers. They don’t tell you everything, and we can’t claim every good thing that happens in a young person’s life is down to us. But they do tell you that something is working, and that the schools who once had doubts are now the ones asking us back.
The stories behind the numbers
The figures matter, but the stories are what keep me going. I won’t share names, because these are young people’s lives, not marketing material. But I want to give you a sense of what NEET prevention looks like on the ground.
The young man who didn’t miss a single session. He came to us in his twenties, not in education, employment or training, on an employability programme we deliver through NOCN.
When we asked the group to write down their goals, he wrote that he wanted to become a coach for young people with additional needs, people like him. He led that group and never missed a session. He now volunteers with us and runs classes of his own every week. He went from being someone who needed support to someone giving it.
The lad who couldn’t get on a bus. He first came to us through our SEND classes, and his parents drove him over an hour each way to get there. At the start, public transport genuinely terrified him. Over time, as his confidence in the gym grew, he decided to push himself to get there on his own: buses, taxis, trains. He went on to our post-16 programme for young people at risk of becoming NEET. Today he works in IT for an engineering company, and he’s been abroad with his mates. When I think about where he started, that still gets me.
The 16-year-old who went all the way to a degree. He joined a funded programme we ran for young people who weren’t in work or education. He did so well we brought him in to help on our community outreach sessions. From there he went to college, then university, and finished a degree in sports psychology. He now works full time as a personal trainer, and still gives us around ten hours a week coaching on our education programmes. He came back to give what he got.
The ones who found work through the people around the gym. Some of our lads have gone into trades as electricians, bricklayers and in air conditioning, through businesses connected to the gym. In some cases, the employers knew them because they’d seen how they trained: turning up, working hard, taking instruction. That reputation got them through the door.
The apprentices. When some of our young people hit 16 and didn’t know what came next, we offered apprenticeships. They gained coaching qualifications, first aid and safeguarding training, and delivered sessions for younger kids. One of them, who first walked in as a quiet primary school kid in trouble at school, is now serving in the armed forces.
Not every story is a straight line
I’d be lying if I said every young person who comes through our doors leaves with a happy ending.
Some come and go. Some do brilliantly for a year, then life at home or on the street pulls them back the other way. Some carry needs that mean the world of work will always be harder for them than it should be.
We don’t give up on those young people. We keep the door open. Sometimes the most important thing we do is be the place someone can come back to when they’re ready.
Why the recognition matters
This year, Training Cave became a quality assured alternative provision with Kirklees local authority. We’re also an approved centre with AQA, NOCN and the Leadership Skills Foundation, and we’re now approved to deliver maths and English, which we teach through boxing and fitness.
On paper, those are badges. To me, they’re proof that people whose job it is to check, question and hold organisations to a standard have looked closely at what we do and said: yes, this is the real thing.
When I think back to those early meetings and the uncertain faces across the table, that shift means a lot. Not because we’ve “won,” but because it shows the perception of what boxing can do for young people has genuinely moved.
Boxing was never really about fighting
What people often don’t realise until they step inside a gym is how much structure there is.
You can’t walk into a boxing gym and do what you want. There are rules. There’s respect for your coach, for your training partners, for the people who were there before you. You learn that progress comes from showing up when you don’t feel like it. You learn that getting knocked back is part of it, and what matters is what you do next.
Discipline. Resilience. Respect.
Those aren’t buzzwords on a poster. They’re what the sport demands of you. And they’re exactly what a lot of young people need, especially the ones who have lost faith in school, in adults, or in themselves.
Boxing is the tool. It’s never been the outcome.
We’re not here to replace schools
Training Cave isn’t trying to be an alternative to school or to do what teachers do. Schools do an incredibly hard job, often with fewer resources every year.
We’re here to work alongside them. Sometimes a young person needs a different door back into learning. For some of them, that door is a gym, a coach who believes in them, and a routine they can hold on to. Our job is to help them get back on track, and then back into the places and opportunities that will carry them forward.
Still not sure about us?
If you work in a school, a council or a business and you still have that same picture in your head when you hear “boxing,” I get it. I’d just ask you one thing: come and watch a session.
Doubts were fair when we started, and we’ve worked hard to answer them. I’d rather you see it for yourself than take my word for it.
Every young person deserves a route back on track. That’s what we’re here for...