Issue - meetings

To consider a report of the Deputy Director of Public Health

This report aims to summarise the support schools receive, primarily through the Stockport Schools Sport Partnership, to promote and facilitate pupil engagement in physical activity, both as part of a healthy lifestyle and in enhancing educational attainment and ‘life skills’.

The Board is asked to note and endorse the work of the Stockport Schools Sport Partnership as a key mechanism for addressing physical inactivity within Stockport and impacting positively on both educational and health outcomes for pupils in Stockport.

Officer contact: Russ Boaler, 0161 474 3941, russ.boaler@stockport.gov.uk

The Deputy Director of Public Health submitted a report (copies of which had been circulated) summarising the support schools receive, primarily through the Stockport Schools Sport Partnership (SSSP), to promote and facilitate pupil engagement in physical activity, both as part of a healthy lifestyle and in enhancing educational attainment and ‘life skills’.

The following comments were made/ issues raised:

·         Nearly all children in Stockport were engaged with this programme. Working with schools exposed children to sports they might not otherwise ever get involved with. The Programme was something all involved with should be proud of.

·         Providing first aid training would complement the leadership elements of the programme.

·         Approximately 88% of primary schools and all secondary schools and colleges were engaged with the partnership.

·         It was important to ensure that engagement was not always with the same young people, and to try to equip schools to be able to deliver the programme and initiatives themselves.

·         It was wrong to think of those not being sporty as inactive. In response this was acknowledged but the limits of the data collection meant that non-sports activity was not necessarily accounted for Nevertheless schools and partners did provide other physical activity programmes, such as a ‘bike-ability’ programme to improve road safety skills.

·         What more could be done to improve further the impact of the programme? In response it was stated that stated that improving impact was becoming increasingly harder, particularly as secondary schools received no extra funding to support this work. The Council worked hard to ensure schools bought back into the service, and then built a programme that drew upon experience of what had worked well. There was also an ongoing challenge of the ‘squeeze’ in the timetable for PE, particularly for Key State 4. The Partnership was also giving priority to early year interventions to promote ‘physical literacy’ as increasing number of young people lacked those skills that need for learning and development, such as fine motor skills. As part of the change in emphasise of the Partnership it was changing its name to SHAPE to emphasise activity over sport.

·         Further information was sought on how the programme developed leadership skills. In response it was stated that a key element of the programme was coaching and supporting participants, including recording and monitoring, rather than simply competition and performance. Encouraging older children to lead activities for younger children was also a feature, including break time activities as sedentary behaviour at break time could still be a risk factor for health, regardless of how much other activity a child might do.

·         The variety of options children had through these programmes was impressive, and the benefit of doing this through school was that it reduce pressure on families in terms of costs and travel. It was important to be able to give young people opportunities to engage, take part and excel at a range of activities.

RESOLVED – That the report be noted and Russ Boaler be thanked for his attendance and presentation.