Ariki Tibble School Sport Team Leader Sport Bay of Plenty

I believe that secondary school sport, when delivered in the right way, can be a vehicle for engaging otherwise disengaged students, improving educational outcomes, and enhancing school culture.

The key part of that sentence was 'when delivered in the right way”. What do I mean by that? Anecdotal evidence gathered from numerous conversations with teachers, sports coordinators and Principals suggests that when teachers are involved with school sports teams, sport and education outcomes improve. The key to this is the increased number of opportunities that teachers who are involved with sport get to engage with their students in an informal setting. The strong relationships forged in the sports arena cross over into the classroom which has a positive effect on student engagement and learning.

So what is the current state of teacher involvement in secondary school sport? The New Zealand Secondary Schools Sports Council (NZSSSC) collates a national sports census annually. Sports Coordinators input data throughout the year into their schools data management system. In November, at the click of a button, a snapshot of the schools sport data is collated into a report and sent to NZSSSC. The types of data collected include:

1. The number of participant involvements in school based sport,
2. The number of coaches, managers and officials that are actively delivering sport in the school, and;
3. The source of the coaches, managers and officials; Support staff, Teachers, Community, or Students.

While there are several limitations to the census, it is our greatest source of school sport data in New Zealand and the information that has emerged from the data reveals some concerning trends. Perhaps the most significant trend is the growing divide between student involvements and teacher involvements. Put simply, student involvements are on the rise and teacher involvements are falling. This is the number one issue in secondary school sport across the country. It raises several questions such as:

• Why is teacher involvement decreasing?
• If teacher involvement is decreasing, who will fill the void that is left?
• What will be the impact on student learning and engagement if student's opportunities to know their teachers in social environments are reduced?
• What will be the impact (cost /culture) if external parties are required to deliver and support school sport.

I don't have many answers, but I certainly have a lot of questions. I fundamentally believe that teacher involvement in sport is critical for developing a culture of student/teacher engagement. So perhaps the only question that matters is; how do we turn this around?