Youth sport and physical education in France and UK
Phil Revell
August 2004
The author
Phil Revell is an English education journalist, writing for the Guardian and the
Times Educational Supplement.
Before trying his hand as a writer he worked as a teacher in English comprehensive
schools, where he taught a variety of subjects including PE.
He is a qualified coach in two sports, rugby and kayaking. Whilst working as a
teacher he coached children in both sports, and led groups on adventure trips in the
UK and mainland Europe.
Two Schools
Penryn College and Le Collège Antoine de Saint-Exupéry are very similar schools.
Both are in tourist areas, both celebrate good exam results; both have a good
reputation for sport and extra curricular activities.
Penryn serves a rural community between Truro and Falmouth in Britain's south
west. Saint-Exupéry is one of several collèges in Vannes, on Brittany's southern
coast.
Both schools offer team games, with rugby high on the list. Both offer adventure; the
Cornish school is a sports college, specialising in outdoor and adventurous activities.
The French school has a climbing wall and horse riding is an option. Yet a close
examination reveals some interesting differences.
The PE diet in the Breton collège is more individual. There are fewer team games.
Children can follow the circus arts and gymnastics. There are handball and
badminton courts, and two artificial playing surfaces, but no big expanse of playing
fields. Much of the provision is off site, at the local stade and piscine. Few French
schools have an attached pool or athletics track.
Penryn, however, is the hub of the local community. It has sports fields, a pool, a
running track, its sports facilities are intended for community use.
This isn't an accident. Government policies in the two countries have created very
different forms of provision. In the UK sports provision for young people is focused
on schools. In France clubs and local authorities play a much bigger role.
As we might expect there are also differences in the levels of financial support, in the
funding routes and in philosophy of provision.
And the result? The French system appears to involve more young people in sport
and more of them appear to go on to some form of competition. Comparisons are
difficult, but participation rates offer us some interesting figures.
A MORI poll (see tables) for Sport England offers a dispiriting picture of a country
where children can only muster the enthusiasm to play their national sport on a once
a month basis. Overall 8 out of ten children did something once a month, but the
figures offer no comfort to anyone who values sport and exercise.
Contrast that with the French situation, where two thirds participate once a week and
over a third hold a participant's licence in at least one sport.
Sports participation outside school
lessons - England 2002
Sports participation - France %
12-14 15-24
Children aged 6-16 participating at least 10 times
in previous 12 months
%
Boys
Girls
Activity
Football
Swimming
Cricket
Athletics
Run/jog
Gym/tramp
Dance
Netball
Walking
58
48
22
13
12
11
11
1
21
17
55
5
13
10
22
21
3
23
Once a week
Club member
66
51
75
38
Competing
Holding a licence
30
33
28
38
Source: Ministère des Sports/Institut National
du Sport et de l’Éducation Physique (2002) Les
pratiques sportives en France Enquête 2000
Paris: MdS/INSEP
Sport England /MORI (2003) Young people and sport in
England: Trends in participation 1994-2002
Olympic medals (summer games)
1994-2004
Great Britain
Gold Silver Bronze
34
50
63
France
Gold Silver Bronze
57
42
73
Total
147
Total
172
More controversially, the different systems have an impact on elite sport, which
seems to be more robust in France. The evidence for this goes beyond a soccer
World Cup. France, a country with a similar sized population and with a comparable
economy, clearly outperforms its neighbour. The question is - Why?
From small beginnings
This year's Athens Olympics saw over 10,000 athletes compete over 28 sports in 296
events. It cost more than €6bn to stage.
Sport is big business, generating €14.6bn in England (2000), just over 1% of
household income and nearly 2% of employment. This is larger than the motor
industry, and half as big again as agriculture. In France sport takes an even bigger
share of the economy. In 2001 it accounted for 1.7% of GDP (€25.4 bn).
Both countries have well-developed amateur sporting systems, Britain’s having
started life slightly earlier. The British scene is particularly complex, with individual
sports' governing bodies for England, Wales, Scotland and Northern Ireland. In
England alone there are over 470 bodies for over 100 sports; these affiliate about
150,000 small single-sport clubs. A 2003 estimate put membership at 5.3m in
England (perhaps 6.25 million in the UK or 8.5% of the population).
There are separate overarching structures for Great Britain (Olympics) and for the
United Kingdom (government funding). Youth sport is subdivided again, with
separate organisations for youth and school sport, sometimes with competing events.
In France things are a little simpler, with eighty national sports' organisations and
165,000 clubs. The French government licenses participants and some 13.8 million
people hold a licence, of which 14% are soccer players, 10% tennis players and 7%
skiers.
Sportsmen and scholars
In nineteenth century Britain sport and physical education were very different things.
Sport - in the sense of an organised competition - was almost exclusively the
preserve of the public schools and universities. Physical education was about
exercise and discipline, with the Swedish Ling method the most popular form.
By 1933 the physical education curriculum included gymnastics, plus games,
swimming and dancing. Local authorities started to provide playing fields, often as
job creation schemes during the Great Depression.
In France fencing and gymnastics came from military academies (notably Joinville)
via a Spanish master, Amoros. They were first taught voluntarily in primary schools
and then, in 1869, mandated by ministerial circular in lycées, collèges and teacher
training collèges.
Under the Popular Front government of the 1930s paid holidays appeared, alongside
50% subsidies for community and private facilities. The same era saw the creation of
the Popular Sports Licence for competitors.
After 1945 PE was seen as an aspect of social rebuilding, and Associations Sportives
(supervised for 3 hours a week by PE teachers) were introduced in secondary schools
and made voluntary for primary schools.
From 1953 experimental ‘Classes de Neige’ began, taking children to the mountains
for winter sports. 'Classes de Mer' soon followed for water sports. At first places at
these two-week 'vacances sans parents' were reserved for children from towns and
cities. But recently the facilities have been more widely used.
New curriculum arrangement in 1969 gave French primary children a theoretical six
hours of PE, reduced to five hours in 1977. Secondary students had the same
entitlement, though instructors offered some provision off-site. The curriculum
became more sport-specific, and children were examined in athletics, gymnastics or
swimming, plus one free choice activity. PE accounted for about 8% of the
Baccalauréat.
Talented older children (15+) have a chance to attend one of 200 regional Section
Sport-Etudes where there is a academic curriculum in the mornings and sport in the
afternoons.
The new curriculum was not introduced without tensions. Some qualified teachers
resented the use of coaches or instructors taking the place of qualified teachers,
reflecting current concern in England regarding teaching assistants.
Post War England
In England the 1944 Education Act made secondary PE compulsory, and led to an
increase in games-trained PE teachers.
Swimming and some outdoor activities were added to the curriculum, and the range
of games widened in the 1970s as the number of sports halls grew to upwards of
2000. These were built on or close to school sites, to allow for school use during the
day and public use at evenings and weekends.
In primary schools PE was often very limited - and still is - due to a combination of
poor facilities and a teaching force that had neither the training nor the inclination to
deliver the subject well.
A radical change came in 1988, when the government introduced a National
Curriculum in England, Wales and Northern Ireland (Scotland has always had a
separate and distinctive education system).
The new directives, introduced between 1989 and 1992, set out core subjects, with
attainment targets and programmes of study for four key stages, two each in the
primary (5-11) and secondary years (11-16).
PE was allocated a notional 5% of the curriculum, with study programmes related to
six groups of activity (games, dance, gymnastics, athletics, swimming, and outdoor
adventure).
In the mid-nineties the National Curriculum was thinned out after it became clear
that neither schools nor pupils were coping with the weight of content. PE lost status
and games regained their pre-eminence.
Education ministers have a long stated ambition to see 2 hours of 'quality PE' in
English schools. This remarkably unambitious aim has yet to be achieved, despite
the generous definition, which allows both curricular and extra curricular PE to be
included.
Headteachers speak eloquently in school brochures about the importance of physical
education, but actual investment in PE staff and equipment lags behind other
subjects. As custodians of sports facilities headteachers leave something to be
desired, through the 1980s and 1990s so many school playing fields were disposed of
that the government had to introduce strict guidelines to prevent the sales.
The luck of the draw
Undoubtedly the biggest change factor in UK sport and physical education in the last
ten years has been the national lottery.
Established by Act of Parliament in October 1993 the lottery went live a year later.
So far it has raised £16billion for a variety of good causes, with sport high on the list.
Lottery funds support Britain's elite athletes and bankroll new facilities for clubs and
communities. Each four years Sport UK spends around £100m in lottery money on
elite athletes. An additional £2bn has been invested by Sport England - responsible
for administering lottery funds to sports bodies at both the elite and grassroots level plus a total of £200m from its Welsh and Scottish equivalents.
The government originally promised to distribute lottery funding using the principle
of additionality, directing lottery money to projects that would not normally be
provided from taxation. But that hasn't prevented a range of new build grants for
schools and universities.
Much of this spending has been focused on an Institute of Sport, modelled on the
Australian template, with regional centres established mainly on university sites.
Bath University is typical, with £23million worth of new multi-sport facilities. The
stable of elite athletes based at the university is called Team Bath, and includes
sprinter Jason Gardner, and judo veteran Kate Howey.
Team Bath brings together senior and development squads and coaches from a
variety of sports including athletics, judo, triathlon, swimming and netball. Junior
and senior players train together with all the benefits that accrue when top class role
models are on hand to aid the development of younger players.
Schools have been promised £750 millions of lottery funded investment, but
planning delays have slowed the implementation of the programme and less than
10% of the money has so far been spent.
Youth Sport Trust
A second major influence in Britain in the last ten years has been the rise of the
Youth Sport Trust.
Originally founded with support from a millionaire philanthropist, the Trust soon
established a programme of activities for schoolchildren, supported by training for
teachers and easy to use equipment. The TOP programme is now a comprehensive
coaching support system starting with TOP TOTS for the early years group and
finishing with TOP LINK for the 14-16 age group.
Specialist Schools
The Youth Sports Trust also co-ordinates the sports element of England's specialist
schools programme. This policy, begun in the nineties, was heavily expanded by the
incoming Labour government in 1997.
It allows secondary schools to focus on one of half a dozen specialisms, including
sport. Current plans are for every secondary school in England to be a specialist
school, with 400 focused on sport.
A different focus
In France sport has been twinned with education and youth for most of its life.
Currently there are two ministries, Sport and Education, which parallel the British
separation, where the Education ministry (DfES) shares responsibility with the
Department for Culture Media and Sport (DCMS).
Similarities end there. In France the government has a far more hands on approach.
The 1992 Sports Act empowered the Minister of National Education to supervise
professional clubs, oversee health and safety issues at venues, and support athletes’
health (powers now passed to the Ministry of Sport).
Influenced by practice in Scandinavia, Sport for All activities in France developed
from 1972 on, through programmes delivered regionally. The target areas were
health, senior citizens, handicapped people and workers. Government investment in
the seventies promoted the building of local indoor, outdoor and open country
facilities, including sport tourism resorts.
There was heavy investment in communes, most French villages have a stade, which
is not dependent on the presence of a secondary school to justify its existence.
Elite sport is catered for at 420 specialist centres. These are Pôles Espoires for
promising athletes aged 12 or over, and Pôles France for established competitors.
There has also been central state support to help athletes cope with studies or a job, a
system only just being investigated in England.
Schools play their part in this system, virtually all collèges and lycées meet national
targets for three hours of PE and two hours of sport each week. But the provision is
for sports like athletics, basketball and volleyball rather than those requiring
specialist facilities. Schools like Brittany's Collège Saint-Exupéry depend to a much
greater degree than in England on facilities and instruction provided off site.
Sport outside school hours was given a boost in 1998. New funding allowed
communes to contract for lunchtime and evening activities. By the end of 2001 2,200
contracts had been signed, covering 38% of the population.
Advantage France
This investment in local facilities occurred alongside an expansion in private
provision and has created a real imbalance between the two countries. Tennis
provides an example.
In Britain tennis has received more than £87m in lottery funding plus an annual lump
sum of around £25m from the Lawn Tennis Association accrued from its Wimbledon
profits. But the LTA claims it would need an extra £1.2bn to match the provision in
France, which has 5,000 new indoor courts, compared with around 1,200 in the UK.
Estimates suggest that France spends roughly twice as much as Britain on sport and
physical education. But comparisons are complicated by the fact that much of the
British sport spend is delivered in schools.
The French Ministry of Education budget for 2003 allowed €0.35bn for sport and
swimming in primary schools. In England it would be very difficult to identify how
much was spent on the same activities.
English schools run devolved budgets and it is up to headteachers and governing
bodies to decide how much is spent on a particular curriculum area. Most local
authorities offer free swimming sessions to schools, but few schools have a pool
onsite, leaving the majority facing transport costs at least. As a result most British
primaries run swimming as an after school voluntary activity, subsidised by parental
contributions.
Policy and Philosophy
It's clear that both countries see sport as an expression of national performance, with
predictable consequences for investment in elite sport, which has risen steadily on
both sides of the Channel.
In both countries the tensions between sport for health and elite sport have been
evident. British policy has bounced back and forth, with the 1990s Conservative
government seeing health as a separate issue. The incoming Labour government
reversed this policy. Their 2002 Game Plan sought to hit both targets, using mass
sport as a tool for improving health as well as aiming to identify and support talented
performers.
In France Sport for All activities developed after 1972. More recently aiding social
cohesion, code for crime reduction, became a major aim of sports policy.
French teenagers at risk were offered informal 'sports du rue', such as roller skating or activities organised to combat specific social ills. In 1997 the Union Nationale des
Centres Sportifs de Plein Air ran programmes for 55,000 young people at 140
centres in France.
In schools both countries have seen a rise in health related fitness (HRF), which aims
to build understanding of the benefits of exercise and promote participation.
Debates about the value of HRF are ongoing in both countries. Traditional activity
based PE is low status. HRF programmes are more content based and can be
assessed in public examinations, with subsequent benefit to the individual's - and
school's - results profile. Some critics believe that it is this veneer of academic
respectability, rather than any identifiable sport or lifestyle gain, which has led to the
rise of HRF.
Curriculum choices
Perhaps the biggest difference is in the school curriculum. France has traditionally
emphasised swimming, gymnastics and athletics. These are sports high in physical
literacy, offering children the key components for participation in any sport.
In Britain the PE diet is very different. Team games have a much bigger profile and
attempts to reduce their importance have been controversial. Yet team games require
complex sport skills and have the potential to punish weaker players.
The clearest example of this is the divide between what girls like to play - and what
they are offered by schools (figures from the MORI poll op cit).
%
Cycling
Netball
Hockey
Participation aged 6-16 in 2002
In lessons
out of lessons
4
45
33
3
24
6
Any rational observer would read some obvious truths in these figures, which have
been backed up by other surveys, showing girls' preference for individual rather than
team games. But inertia and tradition guarantee netball and hockey a secure place on
the English PE curriculum. How many girls are turned off sport as a result?
Just do it
So what lessons can be drawn from this whistle stop tour of provision in the two
countries?
The first lesson is a simple one. Money works. France spends more on its public
services and French citizens are, on average, better off than their English
counterparts. Sporting provision reflects this, making participation easier in France,
at all levels.
French control from the centre has been more effective than British local provision.
UK sport is held hostage at all levels by labyrinthine structures, with sports
organisations often in conflict with each other.
The British emphasis on school sport as the core of provision for young people is
probably misguided. Sport does not hold a high status in academia and schools faced
with increased public scrutiny of their academic performance have sidelined PE and
Sport.
In France young people can choose sport. It is an option for life. In England, with
fewer facilities and greater child poverty, that choice is often unavailable. Children
are offered school sport as an alternative - but, for many, that is no choice at all.
Sources
Much of the material for this paper came from a research paper, "A basis for fitness
or sloth? - Youth sport and PE in France and UK" by Michael F Collins from
Loughborough University's Institute of Sport and Leisure Policy.
Additional material came from the author's own published work, and from the
archives of The Guardian and TES.
Any mistakes are entirely my own.
Phil Revell
August 2004
philrevell@ukonline.co.uk