New Taskforce on the future of Physical Education

Our ambition is that every young person has access to a high-quality Physical Education

Recently, afPE published their Taskforce document on the future of Physical Education. Together with Physical Education professionals, they created a document that explains in detail the critical and necessary work the PE community is doing to highlight the importance of PE. The future of Physical Education is at a tipping point, but as a community, we aim to shift it into a turning point.

In this blog, we share our key findings of the Taskforce on the future of Physical Education document in a convenient summary that includes the main take-home points.

The Mission

The document highlights that some schools are reducing PE time to focus on catching up on core subjects. This is a major concern. The document discusses how PE must be part of the ‘recovery offer’ post-pandemic, and sit at the heart of every school experience to address the troubling stats surrounding childhood health.

They quote that ‘In 2019, 150,000 children left primary school unable to meet the Physical Education National Curriculum minimum requirement to swim 25 metres’. The PE hub agrees that PE is key to building a healthy, safe, and active future, and it’s now becoming an issue of basic safety. The Taskforce document makes it very clear that reducing a child’s engagement with PE negatively impacts their physical and mental wellbeing and they aim to stop that from happening through evidence-based research and awareness.

The Focus

The afPE Task Force members then document how they, along with the wider PE community, are committed to improving the physical and emotional wellbeing of all children and young people. By working together towards a shared standard, they are committed to achieving their goals.

They express that their long-term goal is to make PE a core subject and to get greater recognition from the government. They aim to ensure PE is taught by highly skilled teachers, that adequate time is allocated in the curriculum, and to raise the profile of this essential subject. This will have a powerful and positive impact on students and schools academically, physically, mentally, emotionally, and socially.

Their Actions and Recommendations

The Taskforce completed a series of meetings to define parameters and priorities, key findings, and recommendations. Evidence was gathered through an online survey, evidence sessions and thorough desk research. Throughout these meetings they discussed:

• Immediate issues to support the government and schools concerning the COVID-19 pandemic.
• The future of teacher training.
• The role of PE in achieving broader outcomes.
• How PE improves the health and wellbeing of children, tackling obesity, building character and resilience.
• Extra-curricular provision.

The intensive research they completed led them to several main recommendations. These are the mains points they are urging the government to consider:

• A targeted summer swimming catch-up for year 5 and 6 pupils using local facilities.
• Schools across all sectors opening their pool to other pupils.
• Placing a highly trained PE teacher in every primary school.
• Including PE in the suite of National Professional Qualifications (NPQs).
• Focus on encouraging future teachers to choose PE through education and influence.
• Drive greater diversity and inclusion.
• Give every child access to high quality and consistent Physical Education.

The Future Plans

AfPE acknowledges that their goals are ambitious. But we all need to be proactive to implement positive change. There will be challenges along the way, but afPE and Task Force members communicated that they are committed to:

• Working with partners and Sports Leaders to bring forward plans for new qualifications as well as develop existing subject leader qualifications.
• Continuing to influence developments at national and local levels that will impact pupils’ physical health and emotional wellbeing
• Regularly review and enhance the current CPD offer
• Work to provide high-quality peer-to-peer learning and knowledge exchange opportunities for members.
• Identify and signpost resources that would be of most benefit.
• Embrace the student voice in developing materials.
• Establishing closer links between PE and health and wellbeing outcomes
• Developing a workforce with the skills and qualities required to assure high-quality physical education and sport in schools and the wider community.

We hope that this blog has given you an insight into the afPE taskforce documents. The PE Hub will be following the developments closely. To find out more about the work we’re doing, get in touch with the team or download the full Taskforce document here.