Building social cohesion through team-based sport

When Kellie Ellis approached Alexandria Park Community School to gauge their interest in co-designing a school sport program, she did so based on her firsthand experiences as a former teacher at the school. 

An associate lecturer in the UTS School of Sport, Exercise and Rehabilitation, Ellis had worked at APCS early in her career. She was familiar with the school’s challenges — cultural, socio-economic and academic diversity that could be a barrier to social cohesion — and she believed strongly in the potential of sport as a tool to help overcome them.

I was employed at APCS in the early 2000s to run programs using sport as the vehicle for education and social connectedness.

This time, I wanted to look at the power of sport to build interpersonal relationships and teamwork skills between the students.

The APCS team had concerns about their Year 8 cohort, who needed support to navigate positive social interactions in and out of the classroom. APCS teaching staff were looking for a tailored sport program that would challenge students to work together, not only to enhance their physical capabilities but to help them cooperate as a team.

For Ellis, returning to APCS was a great opportunity — and this time, she could share it with UTS students and colleagues. She designed the program as a professional placement experience for students in the final year of the Bachelor of Sport and Exercise Science.

Five UTS students signed up for the placement, which gave them 80 of the 140 professional placement hours required to complete their course. Under the guidance of William McAndrew, Clinic Coordinator for the UTS Telepractice Clinic, they co-designed a weekly, two-hour sport and physical activity initiative in partnership with the APCS sport coordinator.

They gave us the parameters around time of day, the student cohort and sports we had to deliver, because it was all part of their timetable and part of the curriculum.

Beyond that, we were free to use our expertise.

The resulting 10-week program was focused on netball (five weeks) and ultimate frisbee (five weeks) and delivered in two, one-hour blocks each week. The first block focused on warm-up activities including speed, agility and mobility drills; plyometric exercises; and benchmarking of students’ progress via evidence-based exercise testing, while the second block focused on game play.  

Each week, after delivering the program at APCS, the UTS students would make a series of refinements based on their own observations and students’ needs and preferences.  

“The exciting thing for the UTS students was that — and they bought into this — they got to plan the whole thing. Each week, they would actually come up with the plan, they would run it past me, I would give them feedback, they would go away and adjust it, and then they would implement it,” McAndrew says.

It was very collaborative.  

UTS student Jonathan Whitehead agrees, saying that the process of planning, developing and continually refining a sport program was an exciting opportunity to build his expertise.

"I’ve taken several key learnings from the placement that have helped my professional confidence. I feel more confident in prescribing, delivering and assessing exercise, and being vocal and talking in front of a large group,” says Whitehead, who has since gone on to work as a strength and conditioning coach at Sydney’s Newington College.

I really improved my active listening and my ability to consider other people’s thoughts and reflect on them. The ability to respond to advice and criticism from more experienced people is also vital in the sport industry and is something we did every week in our reflections.

These are all skills I gained during the placement that have been powerful for my career.

As the weeks passed, the UTS students observed a series of positive changes among Year 8 cohort. Despite initial low levels of engagement, the numbers of students participating in the project increased as the weeks went on. Further, most students demonstrated improvements to their physical capabilities over time.

A number of participants, including some who had initially resisted getting involved, took it upon themselves to mentor other students, resulting in unexpected opportunities to develop their leadership skills. The team-based nature of many of the activities also forced students to interact with others they didn’t know well, leading to better communication outcomes across the board.  

In addition to improved physical fitness and social outcomes, APCS students also benefitted from having access to the UTS teaching team, whose contribution to the school’s sport program came at a time when the education sector was struggling with staffing issues in the aftermath of COVID-19.  

The UTS-APCS program has resulted in a partnership between the two institutions and has also created significant potential for new professional placements in primary and secondary schools for final-year UTS Sport and Exercise Science students.

Based on the success of this initiative, APCS has invited UTS back to continue the work. The UTS team is currently looking for other opportunities to partner on sport programs with other schools in Sydney. 

The problem
Year 8 students at Sydney’s Alexandria Park Community School (APCS) needed support to navigate more positive social interactions in and out of the classroom. Cultural and socio-economic diversity and wide-ranging differences in academic ability were identified as barriers to social cohesion.

The response 
Five final-year students in the UTS Bachelor of Sport and Exercise Science designed and delivered a tailored physical activity initiative at APCS. The program, which gave them 80 of the 140 professional placement hours required to complete their course, was intended to deliver physical fitness outcomes and help build a sense of social cohesion among Year 8 students.

What helped accomplish this? 
An existing relationship between UTS Sport and Exercise Science and APCS was the launching pad for this program of work, and oversight and mentoring from UTS Exercise Science supervisor William McAndrew was integral to its success. The project was made possible by funding from a UTS Social Impact Grant and the UTS Graduate School of Health.

What has changed as a result? 
APCS has seen firsthand the power of evidence-based sports programs and their potential to deliver not just physical fitness outcomes but social impacts. The UTS-APCS program has also created significant potential for new professional placements opportunities for final-year UTS Sport and Exercise Science students.
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