Tuesday 30th April 2019 saw the good news announced that the Primary PE and Sport Premium Funding for 2019/20 will remain at the doubled rate of £320 million. This is fantastic news and gives schools the assurance to plan in advance how they wish to use the funding to help have the greatest impact in their school.
The association for Physical Education’s CEO Sue Wilkinson MBE highlights the following:
“We now have substantial evidence that clearly demonstrates that investing in the school workforce is one of the most effective ways of ensuring all children and young people increase their confidence, competence and academic achievement.
“Physical Education School Sport and Physical activity are tools that make a significant contribution to whole school improvement. In addition we know that the difference this funding has made to the physical and emotional well-being of children and young people is having an impact. This journey has taught us a lot about the destination that we are aiming for. There is no doubt that we much work together to achieve an efficient roadmap that will secure the appropriate outcomes for all pupils.
“We must leave a legacy from this investment that ensures the health and well-being of the nations young people is a priority as well as improving such values as character and resilience, and secures Physical Education at the heart of school life”.
Schools are being strongly advised to think carefully before allocating this next years spend, especially where they have been spending large quantities of it to use external coaching companies for delivery of any kind. It may be that this is the last year of the funding and the governments new school sport action plan is due to be published soon which will contain a lot of useful information.
Through the work we do with the Active Partnership overseeing the effective use of the funding, we have identified a great number of ways for schools to use the money to drive forward whole school improvements, as well as additional opportunities in health, PE and sport which will ensure true sustainability.
A key factor in this is to capitalise on the skills we already have as trained teachers and school leaders and not devaluing ourselves thinking that sports coaches are the experts or can show us what to do. Time is also very precious in schools and linking improvements to to other areas of the school development plan and using the funding for release time to embed improvements are also ways to ensure sustainable improvements.
If there are any schools wanting any further advice or support we have a wealth of good practice materials and ideas that have been developed over the past few years working with schools on the effective use of funding that we are more than happy to share and discuss.
Please get in touch via email at PEconsultant@outlook.com or phone 07443473241
