Charity helps school children in Portsmouth meet National School Sports Week target

Currently, only 47% of young people are meeting that target, set by the UK’s Chief Medical Officer, who recommends every child in the UK gets a minimum of 60 minutes exercise per day.

To help meet the target, schools and organisations were asked to offer 30 minutes of in-school activity and 30 minutes outside of school. This comes at a time where leading sport governing bodies are urging all political parties to increase the curriculum to 2 hours of physical activity.

Alongside the physical benefits, the recommendation has been implemented to boost young people’s mental health and help develop crucial life skills.

Greenhouse Sports is a charity helping young people in Portsmouth reach the activity target by funding, and placing, elite sports coaches into schools’ full time to run free to access sessions every day.

Greenhouse coaches become embedded within the school’s staff and aim to not only give kids access to sport, but also to mentor and support their personal development through sport. The charity now has coaches in Portsmouth, London and Leicester, with coaches currently working at five schools in Portsmouth.

Victory, Castle View and Beacon View have all had Greenhouse coaches embedded since 2022, while Abbey Mead and Ark Charter both started programmes in September of last year.

The five programmes have over 650 students involved with participants achieving well above the national average hours of physical activity. Over 22,500 hours of additional coaching has been provided in the area, on top of curriculum PE sessions, helping children meet, and exceed, the national target.

Ashley Willets, who coaches multiple sports at Beacon View and is a Portsmouth local, said: “I coach over 116 pupils here and it’s amazing seeing these young people develop. It’s really important children are given access to sport, the impact it has is clear to see and goes well beyond the physical benefits.

“It’s great that National School Sports Week helped to highlight the need for more access to sport and activity. It’s vital that message continues to be heard beyond this week and it’s a privilege to help students meet the target, particularly working in my local area.”

To find out more about Greenhouse Sports visit: https://www.greenhousesports.org/