On Tuesday 24 September, more than 100 partners convened at the King Power Stadium in Leicester for the annual School Sport and Activity Sector Partnership (SSASP) Summit.

The partnership was established five years ago in response to the publication of the School Sport & Activity Action Plan in 2019. Several partners in the room had been involved since its inception, however many have become involved as the years have progressed and it was important to start the day by reinforcing why this partnership exists, which is to:

• Take collective and direct action
• Use the strength of our united voice
• Improve the sector from within

Running in parallel with the summit was a PE and School Sport Research event which focused on sharing insights and taking a deep dive into the latest research coming out of the sector.

Youth Sport Trust CEO, Ali Oliver kicked off the Summit by addressing the partnership and emphasising the importance of compassion, communication and courage from all sector partners. She included a quote that, ‘we are stronger when we listen, and smarter when we share,’ which embodies the strength of collaboration.

We were fortunate enough to have the Minister for School Standards, Catherine Mckinnell MP, record a short message for us highlighting the importance of PE, school sport and physical activity in education, and her optimism with the new government. This was followed by Matthew Hopkinson from the Department for Education who spoke further about government updates, in particular the much-anticipated Curriculum and Assessment review. The call for evidence was announced the day after the summit, and sector partners can have their say by clicking here.

The opening addresses were rounded off by Charlie Crane from Sport England, who spoke about developments from the School Games Organiser Review. This examined the impact and value-for-money of the network in its current form, and options for what a re-imagined school sport network could look like in the context of the changing education and sport landscape.

We were delighted to be joined by a number of youth representatives from across organisations in the sector as youth voice was embedded throughout the day. They not only contributed in the sessions and discussion, but were given the opportunity to address the sector on multiple occasions throughout the day on the importance of including youth voice in the work we do.

Following the opening addresses, an interactive session was delivered on the 2024 Annual PE & School Sport Report. The session recalled the key statistics relating to physical and mental health, and the deepening inequalities, before looking at the challenges that schools face, and what positive action can be taken to address them. Following the session, partners were split into separate breakout rooms to discuss the report, review the existing sector pledges and start thinking about how the sector moves forwards with a united agenda.

After lunch the focus shifted to the themes that the sector had agreed upon in 2023 that resulted in the creation of the SSASP Action Groups:

• Physical Literacy
• Youth Voice
• Workforce Development

The underlying thread that runs through the three themes is tackling inequalities, and the afternoon sessions started with a panel discussion, hosted by Frazer Simpkins, the Facilitator and Curriculum Manager from 2-3 Degrees. Taking part in the discussion were partners and young changemakers who delivered the Unified Action Framework, to diversify sports governance. The panel shared their learnings and recommendations and challenged the sector to make considered approaches to ensure the barriers young people from diverse backgrounds face are addressed.

The final session of the day focused on the work of the SSASP Action Groups, starting with a video which was recently filmed with school children to ascertain their relationship with movement and PE. We heard from members of all three groups and a consistent message coming out of them all, was the need for consistency of language, and as the video symbolised, our collective ‘why?’ - the desire to support the sector in giving positive experiences to all young people. The session ended with the physical literacy action group launching the Physical Literacy Toolkit which can be previewed here.

The toolkit has been developed to support workforce development in relation to building physical literacy knowledge and understanding. It provides short, snappy tasks that can be used as part of staff and wider workforce training and meetings. Once fully launched, the toolkit will be presented as an interactive editable PowerPoint.

The day was rounded off by sharing headlines that came out of the morning breakout sessions. These were not new pledges but form the foundations for new pledges to evolve and over the next month the plan is to utilise the wider feedback and develop a first draft set of pledges to circulate and gain feedback.

At the start of this new academic year, and with a change of government, we are full of optimism of what the School Sport and Activity Sector Partnership can achieve together.