Paul Vandenbergh's link from Port Adelaide club between education and sport for Aboriginal youth keeps growing

As Port Adelaide Football Club's Indigenous programmes director, Paul Vandenbergh grew the Aboriginal Power Cup from 10 participating schools to more than 75 schools across South Australia, making it the flagship for Indigenous school retention in Australia.
Image courtesy Port Adelaide Football Club

Paul Vandenbergh’s 10 years (2010-20) as Indigenous programmes director at Port Adelaide Football Club, creating life-changing experiences for Aboriginal youth across South Australia and the Northern Territory, grew to a wider vision.

As first Aboriginal person appointed a senior executive of an AFL (Australian Football League) club, Vandenbergh’s achievements at Port Adelaide included:
• growing the Aboriginal Power Cup programme from 10 participating schools to more than 75 schools across South Australia, making it the flagship for Indigenous school retention in Australia,
• introducing of the Willpower programme for primary school aged Aboriginal youth in South Australia and the Northern Territory,
• delivering cultural awareness sessions to key groups,
• developing and introducing the club’s first reconciliation action plan,
• the first Aboriginal AFL academies for both boys and girls.

Port Adelaide Football Club chief executive Matthew Richardson said Vandenbergh had left behind an extraordinary legacy.

Vandenbergh, a Wirangu man from South Australia’s far west coast and a former Canberra Cannons NBL (National Basketball League) player, in 2021 was appointed by the Australian Football League as diversity manager with the AFL Talent Team. Vandenbergh would lead all state and club next generation academy programmes and the national AFL talent diversity programmes to improve outcomes for Indigenous and multicultural players across Australia.

In 2021, Vandenbergh also founded Tjindu cultural engagement foundation, building on concepts developed at Port Adelaide club. Tjindu Strong, extending the Willpower programme, provided cultural and educational support for Aboriginal students in remote communities, encouraging “smart life choices supported by guided discussion workshops”.

Tjindu’s other programme was its AFL Max Academy ­– “high-performance Australian football program for Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander senior students”. This was in partnership with the AFL Max centre set up by former Geelong Football Club premiership player and Adelaide Crows forward James Podsiadly. Thirty boys and 30 girls would attend once-a-week sessions, with successful participants earning a Certificate III in sport coaching, gaining points towards their South Australian Certificate of Education and opportunities for further workforce participation. These replaced the Aboriginal academies run at Port Adelaide club.