Pupils helping to organise as well as play sport

Sports councils — or even just the pupils who voluntarily help organise sports events — play an increasingly key role in keeping things ticking over

at secondary schools. Today’s focus of the regular Secondary Sport page is on pupils who help promote sport at their respective schools.

Dunstan High School

As sports leaders, Lucy Sawers and Joe Cockburn sit on the sports council and run a pupil-led sports committee held to give pupils the opportunity to have their say on sports and sporting situations at Dunstan.

The meetings are held once a month and consist mainly of senior pupils.

However, we are hoping that with a bit more encouragement, more juniors will start to attend.

At recent meetings, we have been discussing with the school house captains about new house events which could be included in the calendar year.

In recent times, Dunstan has had an erg competition in which each house has 10 participants and the winning house is the house that rows the furthest in 10 minutes.

As leaders, we have been discussing the revival of this competition, and it’s set to go ahead this term.

 We are also working with some sports council members and their plans on providing more things to do at lunchtimes for the junior pupils.

The plan is to involve a large range of sports to keep the younger pupils active and entertained during lunchtimes.

We finish the year with our largest project in organising and MCing the senior sports awards evening in October.

Blue Mountain College

Because Blue Mountain College is small, we don’t have a sports council, but students get involved by helping with events such as our annual Tokomairiro High School sports exchange which was held this month after being cancelled last year due to Covid.

Some of our sports leaders reported back on the exchange and this is what they had to

say. —

“It was great to take part in my first chess tournament and play against another school. I absolutely loved it.’’ (Tyler McGarvie, year 13).

“Was great to have a win against Toko in rugby today. I really enjoy the sports exchanges and the opportunity to play against teams we don’t face in our local competition.’’ (Jock Davies, year 13).

“Getting a chance to coach my basketball team at school was great. It was great to see how they would go against a different school and area. I also enjoyed helping out at basketball on the bench and wherever I was needed.’’ (Caleb Stuart, year 13).

“We always enjoy the sports exchange days; it’s a good chance to play against teams we don’t meet at tournaments or in our usual Saturday competition.’’ (Brylee Dawson Tait and Cheyanne Candy, year 13).

“We had a great day.” (overall golf winner Finn Stanley, year 11).

Logan Park High School

Our student sports council has been running for more than 10 years. It is made up of sports prefects, the sports co-ordinator and pupils who are keen to be involved in organising fun events.

Having pupils from across different year groups helps opinions from a wide range of pupils be heard and helps the younger ones understand the aspects of being a leader in our school.

Over the year, our student sports council runs interhouse competitions and lunchtime sporting events such as dodgeball, netball, futsal and others.

These events serve as a great way to make friends with people throughout the school from different classes and year levels.

This year we have also focused on inclusiveness of activities for those pupils who do not normally play sports. We have made it less competitive and encouraged more participation with fun adaptive sports games.

Another initiative is our girls zone times in the gym, which focuses on supporting girls’ participation in sport. Girls zone is run by senior girls alongside our sports co-ordinator.

Several talented sports pupils are enjoying working on resilience and leadership with community leaders and mentors.

Reflecting, appreciating, goal setting and journalling have been important features of the programme.