Agenda item

Please introduce yourself and outline the responsibilities that your post involves.

I am the Director of YPSA, which I set up in March 2010.  The aim is to help schools to meet their pledge of providing five hours of physical education for every pupil each week, and to help them deliver wrap-around education.  YPSA helps them set up breakfast clubs and lunchtime and after-school activities.  YPSA aims to support a school to provide these services in their own format and in a programme with which they are happy, and we work with them to establish this package.  Many schools are under pressure to provide more PE, and many teacher training courses simply do not include sufficient PE training.

My background is in physical education.  Previously I have been a PE specialist and a PE consultant, and have a Masters degree in sports management.  My business partner and I hire ourselves out to help schools.

Please outline the Extended Services that the Young Persons’ Sports Academy offers, and how these services are structured, commissioned and delivered. Can you give an example of the sort of schools you work with, and how much you charge for your service?

We had hoped to be working with two schools by this summer, but we found a greater need than we expected and we are currently working with four schools, and I will start working with a fifth this afternoon.  We have eight coaches on our books.  We work with a Community School, at which I have a coach who is now settling in to run their breakfast club from 8.00 to 9.00 am daily.  Once we have started a new working relationship and placed a coach in a school, I go back to visit and appraise the set-up.  We have an ongoing monitoring role. 

The costs to us of setting up a new placement include the costs of CRB checks on each of our coaches, and we have liability insurance of £5 million, which we are required to have.  We charge a school £30 per hour for our services.

What type of working relationship exists between the Young Persons’ Sports Academy and Kent County Council?  How would you like to see this relationship develop into the future?  In which ways – if any – can collaboration and partnership working between all organisations involved in providing Extended Services in the County be improved?

I was introduced to Emma Jenkins and have had brilliant support, advice and help from her.  I was able to share some of my contacts with her team, so the relationship has been reciprocal and it has been an ideal platform for me to work from.  I found that Emma had incorporated my logo into an Extended Services best practice document, which I now use as a working document for my company.   I have also worked with the Kent Sports Development Unit (KSDU).  I have a good partnership with the KCC, and this link has been commented on in a recent Ofsted report for one of the school I work with. In terms of improving this collaborative working, more inter-departmental working would help.  I think KSDU could work more with other partners, but they do not seem to see the value of this.  I appreciate that different teams and units have different remits, but more linkages would help. 

In your experience, what are the main benefits resulting from the provision of Extended Services, and what are the main challenges in providing Extended Services?

One of the benefits is that schools get good value for money. Budgets are a challenge, as is the lack of PE training delivered on teacher training courses. 

All political parties have recognised the importance of PE in enhancing a child’s behaviour and academic ability.  I thought Loughborough University was supposed to be very good at PE training?

Yes it is, but we are hiring teachers who are coming out of Kent colleges, and it is frustrating that they do not have national qualifications. The reluctance of KSDU to be involved is also a challenge.  The work they are doing is very engaging and I want to be more involved.  I have attended some of their courses, and will continue to do so.  I have to fill in the PE training that my coaches have not had previously, and covering this gap is expensive for me.  The training issue is my major challenge, as the success of my company will rely on the quality of my coaches.

In your opinion, how can these challenges be resolved?

More collaboration would help.  Unless colleges spend more time on training this will not improve. I worry that graduate PE teachers will be going into schools with insufficient skills.

In which ways, if any, might the reduction of Government funding for Extended Services in future years, and the possible shrinking of the Extended Services team, affect the provision of Extended Services? Would the work done so far on Extended Services be harmed?

I hope that work so far won’t be damaged; I don’t think it will. So much work has been put into establishing this that I hope this won’t be undone.  The Extended Services team has been very responsive to what I have been doing, and I want to keep this relationship.  I think that, as long as good communication is maintained, the good work done so far won’t be undone.  I know that some companies used to mislead schools about the range of sports they could offer, but I hope that our work has helped schools to be able to have more trust in the services they are buying.

Would you be able to market yourselves directly to schools, with no help from an Extended Services team?

Possibly, yes.  In the half term holiday we worked with Larkfield Primary School to use their premises for community activities for 5 to 16 year olds. 

In your view, what Extended Services activities have the greatest impact and benefit for the community, and what programmes are most likely to be sustainable in the future?

The sort of activity we did at Larkfield would be a good example of this. It all contributes to the wrap-around care and out-of-hours service that they are able to offer the local community.

In your opinion, how can Kent County Council, together with schools and other providers of Extended Services, ensure the sustainability of Extended Services into the future?

KCC can help by continuing communication and acknowledging partnership working.  It is also very important that companies delivering Extended Services are assessed and regulated so schools can be confident that they can trust who they are dealing with and rely on the services they are purchasing.

How can we push companies like yours further into the education system, particularly with academies and private schools?

I am open to any type of collaboration, working with 5 to 16 year olds.  There is a big drop-off in the level of sports activity at secondary school level. I do not discriminate between types of school and will work with any.  I think that private schools would be less likely to engage my company as they usually have more sports facilities and staff than other schools and are less likely to need help. When we take on a new contract, we expect to set up the service and then hand it over to the school to run themselves, once the relationship is established.

In your view, in which ways, if any, can Kent County Council, schools and external partners improve the general provision of Extended Services?

By setting up a standard which would need to be met, and ensuring that a provider is qualified.  My company is good at identifying how we can ensure quality, and Quality In Study Support (QISS) has been a great help with this.

How could a school cover the cost of Extended Services if they cannot charge for providing it?  Are there grants they can access?  How could you continue of they could not pay your charges?

Many schools have already set and allocated their budgets when they get involved with us.  For instance, the school I am going to today has a problem with allocating funds beyond September 2010.  I highlight the system for applying for funding and schools then have to apply for it.  This is the system at the moment; unfortunately I cannot apply for funding on their behalf. Maybe I might be allowed to in the future, I don’t know. KSDU helped me to identify the advice to give to schools about funding.

A Community Interest Company (CIC) would be eligible to apply for grants. 

That is helpful advice – I will follow that up.

How can the KCC address the problem of PE teachers not being fully trained when they leave college?  Is there somewhere we can apply pressure to address this?

I think the KCC should press for better PE training as your schools need to have access to well-trained staff.  Sports training contributes to teachers’ leadership skills.  I suggest the KCC could take up the issue with College Deans.  Perhaps the Select Committee could write to them.

Extended Services can be seen as a pilot to provide out-of-hours activity. You could sell your service by charging 30 children £1 per head for an hour’s activity, to cover your £30 an hour charge.  Could schools get sponsorship to provide Extended Services?  How would they go about accessing it?

Sponsorship would be a good way forward.  Schools could get brands to sponsor their Extended Services sports provision, but I would suggest NOT using any fast food companies as sponsors!  I will look into the CIC option which has been mentioned today.  I think most Head Teachers would welcome this idea.  Some Head Teachers are very pro-active at getting money, and make a small charge to each child to attend a breakfast club – eg 50p. To cover our costs of £30 per hour, the school could charge 15 children £2 per hour and encourage them to get their friends involved as this will make it cheaper for each child.  Keeping up the numbers will make it viable to keep the club running.

I applaud the development of sports skills.  Can this be used to help disaffected pupils?  How could you reach out to them?

I am very interested in this aspect, and have just signed up to do a course on sports coaching for disability.  I will tell you a good example of how my service has benefitted a pupil. One pupil at the Community School I work with was never at school on time, and would abscond in the morning as soon as his mother had left him, but since joining the breakfast club he has been encouraged and engaged, he attends more on time, and his mother is happier and more confident with his attendance.  Our service has made a tangible difference to his life, and I would seek more of the same.

You could cite this as one of the benefits of your service in your company’s marketing.

Yes, I seek continuity and to build lasting relationships.  I expect each of our coaching placements to run for at least one year, and I want all my coaches to be fully occupied so they are cost effective.

Some schools would find it difficult to employ a teacher just to teach PE, but a cluster of schools could club together to employ a sports coach, and have them for one or two days each a week.  They could share the costs of providing breakfast or after-school clubs.  Schools are not geared up for this sort of arrangement, and would need the support of the Extended Services team to set this up.  They would need an element of competition to be able to secure value for money and get the best price.

I am pleased that you have raised that! I used to see schools as being very insular, and wondered why they were not keen to swap or share resources with other schools.  Some still seem to have a problem with the concept, and in particular the divide between private and state schools is still very apparent. I think schools should share more and be able to reap the benefits of sharing.

Is there anything else you want to ask or tell the Select Committee?

To be provided with support and taken seriously by Emma Jenkins was a great help when I first approached the KCC.  It would be a great shame to see Extended Services end when so much ground has been covered already.  The KCC should continue to build on this work, but it is important that good communication is also continued.  I would seek assurance that this good work will continue.