2025 has been a year to remember at Fight for Peace. From record-breaking engagement at our London Academy to the growing influence of youth leadership across the organisation, this year has demonstrated what’s possible when young people are placed at the heart of our work – creating champions in the ring, and champions in life.
At our London Academy, we surpassed 20,000 total attendances across the year – the highest number in our history. This milestone reflects not only our expanding reach, but also the trust, consistency and sense of belonging that young people continue to find within Fight for Peace.
Across our Five-Pillar methodology, more young people than ever have accessed Sport, Education, Youth Leadership, Employability and Support Services, even as the wider youth sector faced increasing pressure. As CEO Lee Hemmings reflected, it has been a challenging environment, but by staying focused, adaptable and collaborative, the organisation continued to deliver high-quality support while strengthening its foundations for the long term.
Sport remained a powerful driver of engagement and confidence in 2025, with mixed martial arts, boxing and muay thai going from strength to strength, with more young people competing than in recent years and proudly representing Fight for Peace on the competitive stage. These opportunities have continued to provide a platform for our athletes to demonstrate their skills, test themselves in supportive environments and build confidence both inside and outside the ring – reinforcing sport’s role as a catalyst for personal growth.
Beyond our London Academy, our impact continued to grow with purpose. In 2025 we launched a Youth Leadership training programme designed for use across the sports sector, sharing learning shaped directly by young people themselves. This commitment to youth-led change was echoed in the experiences of our youth leadership group, Youth Power, who spent the year working collectively, learning responsibility and building confidence.
As Youth Power Leader Szilvia shared, the group took real pride in working together to manage their own budget, making sure everyone was included in decisions and communication along the way. The reward was not just a trip at the end of the process, but the sense of achievement that came from functioning as a strong, supportive team.
Our Life Champions course also gained significant traction, with more than 350 coaches across multiple sports now trained to support young people holistically, including a significant number of our Alliance partners.
Our partnerships played a vital role in making this possible, as we continued to work closely with Sport England and a range of local and national partners to extend our reach and deepen our impact, while recognition from Comic Relief laid the foundations for important work tackling harmful norms within our settings.
At a local level, our Newham Collective, the Newham Youth Partnership, is now supporting over 60 organisations to work more collaboratively during challenging times, reinforcing the power of shared learning and collective action.
Youth leadership was not without its challenges, and this too became a source of growth. Szilvia reflected on early hurdles around confidence and communication, which the group overcame by listening to one another, respecting different viewpoints and making space for every voice to be heard. Through this process, the team grew closer, building trust and a sense of belonging that many described as feeling like family.
Another major milestone this year was the completion of our 2026 Strategy, setting a clear direction for where Fight for Peace can have the greatest impact. Lee emphasised that the focus for 2026 will be on deepening impact and building sustainable pathways for young people – including expanding work with Women and Girls, strengthening Exclusion to Employment routes, sharing our methodology more widely across the sector, while continuing to invest in education and life skills – allowing more young people to progress with confidence into positive futures.
That confidence is already visible in the ambitions of young leaders like Szilvia, who shared Youth Power’s hopes to develop and deliver their own workshops, designed by young people to inspire others both within and beyond Fight for Peace – plans that are already beginning to take shape and will grow further in the year ahead. This is youth leadership in action, learning by doing, leading, and shaping opportunities for others.
Our staff and coaches continue to inspire through their commitment, care and professionalism, consistently doing more with limited resources. Above all, it is our young people who drive Fight for Peace forward. Their resilience, ambition and belief in what’s possible underpin everything we do and inform the learning we share with others.
Looking ahead to the new year, inspired by the achievements of the past 12 months, CEO Lee shared his final reflections on 2025: “Fight for Peace is built on the power of sport for development, our embedded five-pillar methodology, and the strength of community and opportunity. As we move into 2026, I’m excited about what we can achieve through more open and collaborative ways of working, and I’m deeply grateful to the young people, staff, partners and supporters who make this impact possible.”
