Meet Nyra: Kicking Goals On and Off the Field

Patrick McPhee

29 July 2025

From sport to study sessions, 8-year-old Nyra is making the most of every opportunity at The Huddle — and loving every minute of it.

Nyra is a grade 3 student who first attended an activity at The Huddle in July 2024. Since then, she has participated in a range of different programs offered by The Huddle. We sat with Nyra to hear about her experience.

In July 2024 Nyra joined Huddle Up! Junior at Docklands with a group of her friends. This is a sport and recreation program for 5-12 year-olds that offers young people the opportunity to get involved and get active through social games and sport. Nyra shared that she “likes that it includes running (and) we get fit!” Also, that she gets to try new sports she may not have otherwise. Since participating Nyra has tried sports including Basketball, Soccer, AFL and more! While participating at Huddle Up! Nyra learnt about Study Squad.

Study Squad launched in Docklands in Term 4 2024 and Nyra as well as some of her friends was one of the first participants. Study Squad provides a safe place for young people to access learning support outside of school hours, Nyra attended almost every week coming in to complete her weekly math homework.

Nyra enjoyed that Study Squad “gave us snacks, has fun study breaks, lots of time to study and a fun game at the end”. Nyra also explained that she enjoyed studying there as she “felt supported with my friends around me”. Through her time in the previous program Nyra learnt about the exciting Welcome to AFL program.

Welcome to AFL is an introductory AFL program for newly arrived, multicultural and international student communities to learn the basics of AFL. Nyra attended Welcome to AFL at Marvel Stadium attending Round 2 of the 2025 AFL season where the North Melbourne Kangaroos beat Melbourne by 59 points. Nyra shared “This was my first game of footy that I watched, I liked having friends there and waving the flag when players kicked goals. I found the players face cards (in the cheer squad) funny.” Nyra also had the opportunity to go on Marvel Stadium where she learnt to kick and handball and she “did better than I expected!”.

Just recently Nyra turned 8 years old making her eligible for her first Huddle Holidays during the July school holidays. Huddle Holidays is a school holiday program that promotes happy and healthy lifestyles to local children, of all cultural backgrounds. Nyra attended the Welcome to Tennis Activity hosted by the Australian Tennis Foundation, here she learnt some basics of Tennis, in a cardio session and met even more young people her age!

Above everything, getting to do all these activities with friends has been Nyra’s favourite part about her time at The Huddle. Nyra’s journey, though just 1 year in time, has already demonstrated part of the life cycle of programs at The Huddle available to young people from 5 through to 25 years’ old and their families. We look forward to seeing Nyra back for more at future programs!

To learn more about the programs mentioned below please click on the below links.