Improving school sport facilities

ENGLAND – Secretary of State for children, schools and families, Ed Balls has announced that 75 sports colleges will share over £21 million ($NZ61.4 million) to improve their facilities.

This funding will ensure sports pitches can be used in the evening and through the winter with flood lights, artificial turf and new tented style sports halls.

Speaking at the 2009 Sports Colleges Conference in Telford, Mr Balls said: “2008 will always be remembered as a fantastic year for sport. We all enjoyed the remarkable achievements by Team GB at the Olympic and Paralympic Games in Beijing. But it was also a remarkable year for sports colleges, PE and school sport.

“Once again sports colleges were the fastest improving specialist school network in terms of GCSE passes. Sports colleges are also leading the way, helping to increase the number of children and young people getting two hours of PE and sport every week – 250,000 more five to 16-year-olds than this time last year.

“There is still a long way to go if we are going to achieve our ambition of five hours of PE and sport per week. But our ambition is to turn best practice into common practice.

“I know that sports colleges will help us get there and I hope that together we can inspire others with National Sport Week this Summer.”