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Extending Activities

School Athletics

The Extending Activities (EA) programme is an integral part of the Government’s PE and Sport Strategy for Young People. This is often referred to as the Five Hour Offer because the overall aim is to provide young people with five hours of sport and physical activity per week.

The Tyne & Wear EA programme which commences in September 2008 will provide a range of attractive and sustainable opportunities in sporting activities for young people from the ‘semi sporty population segment’ to take part in out of school hours in term time. Those young people considered to be semi sporty take part in two hours of sport within school and one hour out of school.

Sport England has provisionally allocated Tyne and Wear £164,500 to encourage and enable in excess of four thousand ‘semi sporty’ young people to increase their participation in sport and physical activity to five hours per week. The year one programme will operate from September 2008 to March 2009 with overall leadership and strategic co-ordination of the EA programme being provided by the Tyne & Wear Sport Core Team. Each of the five Community Sport Networks (Gateshead, Newcastle, North Tyneside, South Tyneside and Sunderland) will be responsible for the co-ordination of an agreed activity programme within each of their geographical areas.

The EA programme is particularly targeted at the age groups that evidence shows are more likely to drop out of sport and physical activity – those aged 10-12 (the transition from KS2 to KS3) and those aged 14-19. Addressing the barriers to participation is particularly important and these include:

Tyne & Wear’s EA plan is currently being assessed by Sport England and the Youth Sport Trust with a final decision regarding funding expected at the beginning of July 2008. Further updates regarding this work area will be posted on the Tyne & Wear Sport website.