Opening Schools Facilities Fund Supports School Gym

This case study reports the Aspire, Chesham Project, in England, South-Eastern Region. The is the result of a collaborative review and evaluation involving teachers and participants. The aim is to celebrate success and to identify learning from the project which can be embedded in future projects.

Aspire is an Alternative Provision (AP) school in Chesham, catering for:

• Children who have been permanently excluded from their mainstream school
• Children who have been identified by their mainstream schools as at risk of exclusion, and who have been accepted by Aspire Schools for a placement
• Children with poor school attendance
• Children whose needs cannot be met at mainstream and where Aspire is seen as a suitable alternative.

Aspire planned to purchase a box gym and gym equipment to provide students and staff an opportunity to be able to improve health and wellbeing. It would be used by students throughout the day as part of intervention and engagement to help improve health and wellbeing.

The teacher said that “these young people never have any opportunities” and were unable to afford to attend a local gym. He considered that having a gym in school would enable students to release energy and self regulate their anger.

The priority was to meet the needs of the students: by creating the gym and gaining good engagement from the young people.

The planned Box Gym was declined by the School Leadership Team as there was insufficient space, but instead, an unused classroom was converted. The Head of PE felt that this proved better than the planned box gym as it was located within the school building and consequently easier to integrate the use of the gym within the school timetable.

As students do not live locally and use taxis to get to school, it’s not possible to use the gym after school. They use it in breaks and sessions are programmed within the school day.

The students have been supported to take ownership of their time in the gym: choosing the music, creating a competition board. Clear guidance on using the equipment has given them confidence and there’s clear behaviour expectations: setting the students up for success.

To read more details from the case study please visit the LEAP website.

Case study courtesy of LEAP.

Image courtesy of Sport England Image Library.