Boarding School - Royal Alexandra and Albert School

As a sports college we are constantly striving to raise standards and increase levels of attainment across the whole school, particularly through our specialist subjects Science, Physical Education and Sport.

We have four key areas we are trying to develop:

All students participate in a minimum of 2 ½ hours of Physical Education per week, exceeding the initial government target of 2 hours per week. On top of this 88.7% of pupils have participated in at least one after school activity this academic year, easily exceeding both the Governments target of 75% and our own Sports College target. Sports Day this year was a huge success as well with 88.2% of pupils participating and enjoying the day.

A recent student survey showed that 94% of pupils enjoy PE and Sport at the school and 95.2% are committed to PE and school sport, a measure of the quality of pupils experience in PE.

2006/7 also saw more opportunities in sport with pupils participating in Golf, Softball and Cycling on top of the existing range of activities offered. As well as the cycling programme in year 7 (where all pupils undertake a Level 1 Cycle Skills course) in 2007/8 all pupils in year 9 will have the opportunity to participate in Kayaking again adding to the massively broad and balanced PE and Sport curriculum on offer.

Pupils excelled in 2006/7 in a range of sports. 71.9% of pupils represented the school at Sport, a considerable way above the Government's target of 30% by 2010. This is a considerable achievement, one that is unlikely to be matched by any other state school in the country, and credit to the hard work and commitment of the young people and staff involved.

Year 7 have been outstanding this year in all sports, winning the district cross-country, rugby and athletics tournaments. 4 boys who were part of all three teams were recognised for their considerable achievement with medals presented before Sports Day. All year groups have performed exceptionally well in Athletics, all finishing in the top three teams in their respective competitions, securing the schools place as the top state school for Athletics in the district.

More pupils than ever before have competed at representative level with over 100 students competing for their district, county or region. Two Year 11 boys are hoping to go on to compete at a national level over the summer with Kola Adedoyin Jumping over 15m in the Triple Jump hoping to win national selection and Daniel Hudson being selected for final trials for the Scotland U17 Rugby team. We wish them both all the best and look forward to hearing how they get on.

A great deal of this success and the opportunity to compete at higher levels can be put down to improved links with local clubs and coaches such as Westcroft Judo club and Reigate Netball Club. The hard work and dedication of the volunteers and coaches at these clubs is much appreciated by both pupils and staff at the school.

The winning forms of Sports Day and the Inter-form competition in year 7,8 and 9 this year have been rewarded with a trip to Aqua Sports Water sports Centre and K2 Leisure centre in Crawley to take part in a range of activities, well done to 7CB, 8BR/AM, 9DST and 10JN / CT.

It is our intention to further develop the performance of pupils through a more comprehensive gifted and talented programme in 2007/8, as well as improving the performance of school teams in our focus sports - Athletics, Badminton, Cross-country, Netball, Rugby and Rounders.

Leadership opportunities have continued to develop with a new batch of Sports Captains selected for 2007/8, details can be found in the Gatton Guide, and awarded Sports Colours. This role will develop over the coming year to give pupils more influence in the development of PE and Sport at RAAS.

Captains of sports teams in all year groups have also begun to take on more responsibility in organising fixtures and communicating with staff, it is hoped this will continue in 2007/8.

The Junior Sports Leaders Award has also continued to develop and this year pupils were involved in the organisation and running of the Surrey Special Schools Cross-Country Championship. The school received a letter after that event complimenting the JSLA students for their excellent efforts. Connor Mitchell in Year 10 has also been selected to represent the school at a number of Youth Sports Trust Events next year as recognition of his leadership skills in PE.

There will be more leadership opportunities in 2007/8 with students in year 9 following a leadership course in their orienteering unit, and greater take up for JSLA planned. This programme is to be expanded to include opportunities for students to develop their leadership skills in languages through the language leaders award. A good example of how the Sports College status is having an impact across the whole school.

Students have continued to develop an excellent understanding of how to lead an active healthy lifestyle with the student survey showing that 93.3% of pupils understand how to get involved in an active healthy lifestyle and 44% of pupils having followed a personal exercise programme over the course of the year.

Year 9 pupils have undertaken a course on active healthy lifestyles and have produced some excellent work. The culmination of this course was for pupils to produce and deliver a presentation to younger pupils encouraging them to get involved in active healthy lifestyles. All of the work produced demonstrated a high level of understanding and some of the work was really outstanding with some excellent videos, leaflets and PowerPoint presentations being produced.

In 2007/8 pupils in year 9 will follow a similar course completing four assignments over the course of the year. These units can be put towards a BTEC first certificate in Sport (worth 2 GCSEs) which pupils will be given the opportunity of finishing in year 10 and 11 (2008-2010).

A great deal has been achieved over the last two years since the school was designated as a Specialist Sports College and firm foundations have been laid for the pupils to go on and achieve even greater things in the coming terms and years, using the Sports Specialism as a spring board to success in all areas of school life.