Empowering young athletes: highlights from Leighton Park's 'Girls Can Week' 2024

LP Girls Can Week kicked off at Leighton Park School on Monday 10th June, inspired by the national campaign ‘This Girl Can’. Nationally, 64% of girls will have quit sports by the age of finishing puberty (aged 16- 17), double the number of boys according to England Netball’s ‘NetballHer’ survey. The aim of LP Girls Can Week is to allow girls to participate in new sports, hear from inspiring sports leaders, create a fun atmosphere to collaborate in sport as a team and promote sport engagement in happy and healthy ways.

Creator of LP Girls Can Week and Head of Netball, Zoe Macpherson, commented on the importance of the sporting week: “It’s the seventh year we are running this event. It’s important we implement new activities for the girls to get involved with. We want to inspire the students to participate, help their physical and mental wellbeing and help them feel comfortable in their own bodies.”

Leighton Park kicked off the week with Old Leightonians, Anna and Tiger, coming back to the park with netball sessions during lunch and co-curricular activities. The pair of netball fanatics, who have now moved on to study Fashion Design & Technology and Sports and Exercise Science at Loughborough University and Oxford Brookes respectively, led the sessions - full of praise for the impact that LP Girls Can Week had on them when they were students. Anna explained her reasons for returning: “I found LP Girls Can Week so beneficial for getting myself into different sports. Having OL’s come in, I was so inspired to see what they had gone on to do after Leighton Park”.

Not only did the students get involved in the week, but the school’s wellbeing platform YouHQ, hosted a podcast with Head of Netball, Zoe MacPherson and Head of Football, Callum Beasley. The podcast discussed the importance of girls' sports and wellbeing. Co-founder of Her Game Too, Emily Drakely, also joined the podcast to share her thoughts on sport being for all. Her Game Too is an official partner with Leighton Park, promoting an environment where girls can enjoy their sport free from prejudice or judgement. Leighton Park was the first secondary school in the UK to partner with Her Game Too. 

The week also coincided with Cricket Week, with multiple cricket fixtures and festivals lined up for the girls. The matches included those against different schools from the Berkshire area, with both boys and girls teams to add competitive play opportunities to their sporting education. There were volleyball and rounders matches. The staff got involved in an intense staff versus students rounders match!

A big part of LP Girls Can Week was introducing the girls to new sports to encourage them to step outside their comfort zones and enable them to feel confident in having a go. This was manifested in Archery, American Football sessions and Judo. Resident PE Graduate, Danny Clark, led the archery session, demonstrating how to master the bow. Many of the girls talked about how enjoyable the session was, made even better by the positive support from all those involved.

Geography teacher, James Hegarty, led the American Football session and has previously taught Team GB American Football. The Year 9 and 10 students threw themselves (sometimes literally) into the game. Once the session finished, the students even asked if an American Football co-curricular hobby could be initiated! James shared his love for the sport, commenting: “It’s nice to be able to bring the sport to the girls at LP as well. It’s a really inclusive sport; it’s open to anyone, any ability, any body shape. Anyone can just pick it up and give it a go.”

Judo was another highlight of the week in trying out new sports. Leighton Park’s Judo instructor, who also happens to be an Olympic Judo Athlete, led a session to teach safe judo practice and useful moves. Introducing less well known sports allows for our students to find new hobbies, passions and interests to expand their activities. Year 7 student, Connie commented: “It’s been really good to meet so many new people from different year groups and to hear from inspirational sports women.” 

Multiple role models visited the Park during LP Girls Can Week, in the aim to inspire the girls in a variety of ways. One of the highlights was Commonwealth Athlete, Pippa Woolven. Pippa spoke to the entire school about her journey as an athlete and how she learned through her career to have a balanced sporting life and how to sufficiently fuel her body in order to avoid burnout. The talk also opened up to a Q&A for students who had the chance to ask the athlete their burning questions.

Another guest visiting the park was Sarah Holmes, from Leighton Park’s sport partner, Go Perform. Sarah spoke on the importance of wearing the right sports bra during exercise and sport to provide proper support, avoid injury and ensure the girls are comfortable. Sarah commented: “There’s a lot of evidence that breasts can be a barrier to sport and activity. It’s about educating them to understand their bodies to help overcome the barriers they might have such as pain or embarrassment from breast movement”. 

The students were also lucky enough to meet Watford Women’s player, Jade Bradley, who attended the very first Berkshire girls’ football tournament, sponsored by YouHQ and created by Head of Football at Leighton Park, Callum Beasley. Jade expressed how glad she was to be able to attend the event: “When I was at school, we didn’t have this exposure. You might have been the only girl playing, but now there’s hundreds of girls!”. The tournament consisted of eight schools from Berkshire playing matches against each other in two age categories, U13 and U15. A great success for Leighton Park’s U13s who snatched the tournament win! This however was not the only football success announced. After a successful season in the girls’ summer leagues, both the U13 and U15 Leighton Park girls’ football teams won their leagues with no games conceded. What wonderful news to end a brilliant LP Girls’ Can Week!