Two-year extensions to School Games Organiser and PE and Sport Premium funding

We’ve also invested £1.5m of National Lottery funding into the Studio You digital library of PE lessons that’s designed to help PE teachers engage the least active girls through non-traditional online lessons.

Since its launch in September 2021, Studio You has reached more than 100,000 11-16-year-old girls, with more than 50% of secondary schools in England signed up to the Netflix-style digital platform.

In addition to the news about the SGO network and PE and Sport Premium, today’s announcement included a raft of other commitments aimed at improving access to sport and physical activity for children and young people.
 

This push for equal access to sports in schools on the basis of gender, again follows on from our existing work to tackle inequalities in activity levels.

We know that children from less affluent families are less likely to be active than those from more affluent families (42% compared to 52%), while 37% of girls only do sport and physical activity in school and that teenage girls, less affluent children, those from Black and Asian backgrounds rely more than others on ‘at school’ provision for their activity opportunities.

This evidence from our Active Lives Children and Young People report (December 2022) shows why today’s commitments are important, and why building on the women’s sporting successes of 2022 – such as the Lionesses’ Euros victory – can only be a good thing.

In August last year the FA’s Squad Girls programme, in which we invested £2m of National Lottery Funding, was launched with the aim of getting more 12-14-year-old girls into football in a fun, non-competitive setting.

Our Active Lives survey also showed that in the academic year leading up to the 2022 Women’s Euros, 100,000 more girls were playing football when compared to pre-pandemic levels, so with projects such as these in place, Culture Secretary Lucy Frazer is confident further progress can be made in improving activity levels of all children, but specifically girls and other disadvantaged young people.

"I will do all I can to help address inequality in sport and today's announcement is a huge boost that will help give girls greater opportunities in schools across England,” she said.

“The Lionesses have undoubtedly inspired the next generation and it is vital that we make sure we have the structures in place at schools and the grassroots to capitalise on that and drive up participation for all the positive life benefits it brings. 

“Having made £1 billion available to ensure the survival of the sport and leisure sector during the pandemic, we are now setting a new standard for ensuring children and young people have the opportunity to enjoy healthy and active lives both inside and outside of school.”