UK Coaching – Written evidence (NPS0054)

As the lead agency for coaching in the UK, we collaborate with participants, coaches and those who employ, deploy and support coaches across the sport and physical activity sector to collectively improve coaching experiences, across the pathway.

Using our research, which demonstrates the positive association between coaching and good mental and physical well-being, we inform Government policy to support coaches to continue having a positive impact on society – potentially reducing pressures on our health and social care systems.

Our fundamental belief remains that Great Coaching changes lives because it’s about people supporting people to be better tomorrow than they are today.

UK Coaching has conducted a number of research projects to understand the impact of coaching on participants. These studies have shown that people who receive coaching in sport and physical activity are more likely to be more active more often than those who do not receive coaching. Furthermore, those who receive coaching are more likely to have more resilient habits and maintain their involvement in sport and physical activity over longer periods, than those who do not receive coaching.[1]

To this end we have supporting evidence that applies some of the questions posed by the select committee and will endeavour to answer each one in turn.

QUESTIONS

Question two: How can children and young people be encouraged to participate in sport and recreation both at school and outside school, and lead an active lifestyle?

The word “crisis” has been used more and more recently to describe the reduction in activity levels of children, especially since the start of the national lockdown in March 2020.  Many groups have conducted research into this area to help support the development of the Government’s School Sport and Physical Activity Action Plan, supporting this move is the most recent Active Lives for Children and Young People reports published by Sport England. The findings show 3.2 million children were active during the 2019-20 academic year, a 1.9% decrease on the previous year’s results. However, still 31.3% (2.3million) children are doing less than 30 minutes of activity per day rendering them inactive based on the Chief Medical Officer Guidelines for Children.

UK Coaching is collaborating with 14 organisations to look to improve provision of sport and physical activity for children and young people.  Through the power of coaching we aim to influence the sector to raise the bar of children’s coaching.  The Children’s Coaching Collaborative has based all decisions and recommendations of Article 3, UN Convention on the Rights of the Child: The Right to Play, The Right to Develop, and The Right to be Heard.

“Children who are coached are – Happier; are more likely to feel the things they do in life are worthwhile; and are more satisfied with their life.”

Question three: How can adults of all ages and backgrounds, particularly those from under-represented groups, including women and girls, ethnic minorities, disabled people, older people, and those from less affluent backgrounds, be encouraged to lead more active lifestyles?

UK Coaching has led for several years a Diversity Expert Group looking at the makeup of participation levels and that of the coaching workforce in the UK, who support the participants to be more active.  We have a lot of quantitative data on the makeup of the coaching workforce from Coaching in the UK 2019.  What it does tell us is there are still barriers affecting different groups from entering a more active lifestyle.  Our research suggests that for some groups in society they would prefer to be coached by “someone like them,” or “someone who understands me.”  If the percentage levels of coaches in the UK is not representative of the participants they serve this can and does provide barriers for people to get involved in sport and physical activity.

The following infographics highlight some of our headline findings.

“Regular exercise has a positive impact on health…There are a number of ways that coaches can encourage adults to be more active.”

“People from low socioeconomic groups are less likely to coach because of factors including inability to access coach education; lack of time; are unlikely to volunteer.”

“Despite being less active women are more likely than men to receive coaching…they believe coaching helps improve their mental health and wellbeing; improve their physical health and improve their fitness.”

Question six: How can racism, homophobia, transphobia, misogyny and ableism in sport be tackled?

What we need to ask is what can coaches’ and the coaching sector do to address this?  Coaches are not in control of all elements, but they can control the following:

• Creating a safe person-centred environment
• Ensure that they understand the needs of those in front of them
• Model and promote respect, understanding of everyone
• Provision of opportunities for people to be physically active – and thrive

We believe that the provision of training opportunities for people involved in policy, provision and delivery of coaching at all levels should be provided for the following reasons:

• To learn more about biases and the lens in which they see the world
• To challenge themselves to ensure that provision and delivery can be accessed by all
• To ensure that environments are welcoming, and people feel respected, included and that their needs are met.

Coaches (people) and provision (again run by people) are key to supporting all from under-represented groups to lead a more active lifestyle

• We know that coaching can help people to get more active and create sticky habits in physical activity
• We need to ensure that organisations are encouraged to safely review and challenge their current services to ensure that what they provide is accessible (in the widest possible sense).

In the past more emphasis was placed on inclusion and diversity, however Club for All workshops are no longer delivered, and Equity in Your Coaching training has been removed from Sport England’s Club Mark scheme.

All services providers and deliverers (coaches and educators) need to be provided with opportunities share discussions, explore their own practices to work together to share ideas to ensure that we can all meet the needs of the people in the communities we serve, through:

• Proactively engaging with all community groups
• Empowering coaches to gain the confidence and competence needed understand equitable practice, and understand the people that we want to encourage to be more active and have a great experience through coaching  
• Ensure that people feel supported in being coached, or their role in coaching

Question seven: What can be done to improve and implement effective duty of care and safeguarding standards for sports and recreation actives at all levels?

Since the Duty of Care in Sport report was published in 2017, UK Coaching have worked hard to ensure that the recommendations in the report can be actioned.  There were many suggestions that Duty of Care is more than Safeguarding but should look at the welfare umbrella to also include Inclusion, Diversity, Mental Health and Wellbeing.  UK Coaching has been leading the way with Duty of Care to help coaches better look after their participants.  We consulted with 200 + organisations and coaches in the sector and have produced our Duty TO Care toolkit, we are emphasising Duty TO Care as this is action focussed and suggests a personal level of responsibility.  The toolkit provides learning solutions for coaches in each of the five pillars: Safeguarding, Inclusion, Diversity, Mental Health and Wellbeing, on completing of knowledges checks against each of these subject matters’ coaches will receive a digital badge.  For more information please go to www.ukcoaching.org/duty-to-care

“The most important element in sport is the people involved, whether they are taking part, volunteering, coaching or paid employment…sport relies on putting people, their safety, wellbeing and welfare at the centre of what sport does.”

28 January 2021