Girls Active

We’ve been working with Youth Sport Trust on Girls Active. This is our commitment to fostering girls' participation in PE, sport and physical activity. The programme aims to tackle the barriers girls experience and through cultivating a movement of girls and young women, empower them to take positive action through influencing, leading, and inspiring their peers.

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The challenge 

Insights showed that girls from Black and South Asian communities and/or from families living on low incomes have disproportionately lower levels of engagement and participation in physical activity.

The solution 

Girls were, and still are, always integral to decision making, working with teachers, identifying needs and co-creating new approaches and solutions to the barriers they and their peers experience.

The impact

Outcomes and Impact

For the School/Deliverer

For the Young People
  • Improved attitude towards PE, school sport and physical activity and for some, attitude to learning and school life.
  • Increased understanding of how physical activity positively. contributes to all girls’ lives. 
  • Increased participation in PE, school sport and physical activity.
  • Increased self-esteem, confidence, and commitment of girls in school. 
  • Improved leadership skills, student voice and a greater number of volunteers within the school.
  • Enhanced pupil-staff and pupil-pupil relationships both within PE and wider across the school.
  • Enhanced personal traits such as self-esteem, confidence, commitment. 
  • Enhanced skills such as communication, creativity, and leadership.
  • Increased understanding of the relevance of PE, school sport and physical activity to their lives.
  • Empowered to contribute to the design and delivery of a relevant PE, school sport and physical activity experience. 
  • Leadership development.
  • Volunteering opportunities relevant to impactful CVs and employability.

How is the new approach being sustained?

Professional development is provided for teachers and leadership development and mentoring for girls is underpinned by the Girls Active programme.

Lessons learned 

The schools engaged in the project were, and continue to be, integral in helping us give girls a voice, deepen our understanding of the barriers the least active teenage girls face to being active and help ensure we give the right support and opportunities, so they experience the enjoyment and wider benefits of being active. 

Insight led us to offer an event that was more focused around building leadership qualities in the girls, that was not only co-created with the girls, but also co-delivered. Girls' leaders and girl participants from each of the four schools attended the event. The girls’ leaders designed a code of conduct for the day, and also t-shirts for themselves and the girls participants to wear – feedback on the day showed the girls really valued us listening and acting on their preferences.

Contact: Katie Crockett [email protected] 

see our video: Girls Active – Girls influencing, inspiring and empowering girls to active