Shapinsay School strikes gold - again! - with sportscotland school sport awards

Shapinsay Primary School have once again achieved ‘Gold’ status in sportscotland’s School Sport Awards, a national, Lottery funded initiative designed to encourage schools to continuously improve physical education (PE) and school sport opportunities.

The coveted award was the result of a huge effort across the whole school community last year, guided by a committee of teachers, pupils and parents with support from OIC Active Schools Coordinator, Kirsty Spence.

Shapinsay Primary School are the first school in Orkney to reach Gold since the sportscotland scheme started up again in September 2022, following a pause due to covid.

Some of the actions the school’s Sport Award committee focused on during their journey to Gold include:

• Applying for funding from Scottish Sea Farms’ Heart of the Community Fund and the Shapinsay Development Trust to purchase new equipment for the school and community, to create a ‘community sports box’ full of fun items for anyone to access out with school hours. The box includes netballs, basketballs, hang-a-hoops, footballs, tennis/ badminton net, rackets and balls, cones and a rugby ball.
• Hosting a successful ‘Active Shapinsay Week’ which offered lots of different activities for the whole community - including health walks, cycling, dancing, football, athletics, racket skills, basketball, netball - so there was something for everyone.
• Teachers undertook targeted training to run a lunch time club for pupils with multigames.
• Creating more opportunities for everyone to be active in Shapinsay.

Kirsty said: “The committee have been fantastic and have shown great skills working together. They’ve been meeting monthly with teacher Mrs Bews to stay on track, and have been brilliant role models for others in the school with their work ethos.

“They are already planning another Shapinsay Active Week again for this year.

“It’s such a huge achievement for this peedie school, and I hope their Gold Award inspires other schools to reach for the top too.”

Teacher Leanne Bews said: “We are so pleased to have been re-accredited with the Gold flag - it is a big achievement for a small school.

“To achieve our previous Gold Award we focused on after school clubs and improving sports opportunities for the pupils in the school.

“This time, however the sports committee decided to focus on the Community aspect and to see how we could get other people in the community active.

“The idea of hosting an Activity week and of providing a community sport box came from the children. They chose the activities and created a timetable and they chose and costed the equipment for the box and helped complete the funding applications.

“Both projects were very successful and this year’s committee hope to build on those successes and plans are already in place for the 2024 Active Shapinsay Week.

“We are always on the lookout for new activities to offer if anyone has a sports skill they would like to share!”

Head Teacher Emma Clements added: “I can’t begin to describe how proud I am of our whole school community - thanks to Leanne, Kirsty and parent volunteer CJ for their hard work guiding us to success!”

Chief Executive of sportscotland, Forbes Dunlop, said: “The importance of sport in school life cannot be underestimated and being awarded a sportscotland Gold School Sport Award is testament to the hard work and effort of pupils, teachers, and volunteers across a school.

“Many congratulations to Shapinsay Primary on receiving their gold rating, every person who has been involved in getting here should be very proud of this brilliant achievement.

“As the national agency we are committed to helping build communities across the country where sport is a way of life, and that young people are at the heart of it.

“Working with local authorities, governing bodies, and national partners, we are strengthening the links between school sport and the communities around them, as well as helping schools continuously improve and celebrate successful school sport models.”

Funded by the National Lottery, the School Sport Award is presented for innovation and achievement in delivering school sport and physical activity. It recognises schools that put young people at the forefront of decision making and planning of school sport and PE, while also increasing participation opportunities.

Just under 900 schools across all 32 Local Authorities are engaged with the award. Over 100 schools have been awarded a Gold award, over 160 silver, and over 100 bronze.

Two other schools in Orkney are also taking part in the award since it relaunched – Stenness Primary who are bronze, and Stronsay Junior High (Primary) who’ve gained Silver. OIC’s Active Schools team is hoping to start working with more schools in coming months.

To find out more about sportscotland School Sport Awards visit https://sportscotland.org.uk/schools/school-sport-award/

Images (left to right):

Image 1: (adults in back row) Teacher Leanne Bews, parent volunteer CJ Battye who runs the after school football club, teacher Anita Angier and Head Teacher Emma Clements with Shapinsay Primary School pupils proudly flying their new Gold flag.
Image 2: Teacher Leanne Bews, CJ Battye and OIC Active Schools Coordinator, Kirsty Spence with the School Sport Award committee.

(Missing from both the photos are pupils Orla Boyd and Maisie Leslie.)