School Sports Plans Unveiled…comment

School sports plans are unveiled Competitive team sports will be made compulsory for all primary school children in England, David Cameron says. http://www.bbc.co.uk/go/em/fr/-/news/uk-politics-19219942

I left school in 1988 having consistently taken part in competitive sport throughout my schooling. I went to state school throughout. It was competitive, we played against many schools at many sports and we won and we lost. I continued on to play football for London University and as an adult I am extremely competitive and continue to play sport (though slightly more slowly than back then!).

We have since lived through a ridiculous era of political correctness where winning has been relegated in favour of competing. The nature of the human condition is to compete and win in all facets of and at all times in life. Children need to learn how to win as well as how to lose to get on in life. Neither can be learned without healthy competition. Across the spectrum of all people there is an enormous range of sporting abilities; let’s not remain in the same pit with sport that we are in with education. Encourage everybody to compete regardless of ability. If an individual is not an able sports man or woman there will be something else in life that they can grasp – that individual is not a failure, they have tried their best and everybody knows where they stand.

I agree with Mr Cameron that, “We need to end the ‘all must have prizes’ culture…” Let’s hope he also applies this ethos to compulsory education some time very soon!.