The Selection Process - FAQ's

What’s the school’s approach to competitive sport?

• We believe that by its nature, sport is competitive.  We enter our strongest team to represent the school in inter-school competitions, subject to the requirements of the host school.
• Selection to represent your school is an honour.  We would like pupils to feel a sense of pride and achievement through selection and taking part in inter-school competition.

Does everybody get an equal turn?

• Unfortunately, no.
• There are too many pupils who want to represent their school and not enough inter-school competitions for everybody to have a turn.
• Team sports require an element of continuity.  Players selected need the chance to get used to training, playing and competing together.
• At the beginning of the school year, older pupils may be given priority over younger pupils.  Towards the end of the competition season, younger pupils may have priority over older pupils to build depth in our squad for the next season.

How does a child get selected?

• The majority of squads are chosen during a squad selection session at the start of a half term. Following the session, selected children are invited to continue to train as part of the squad.
• Some squads are chosen without a squad selection session. On the rare occasion when this does happen, the selection is based on the professional judgement of PE teachers from their knowledge of pupils.

How does a child keep their place?

• Boys’ football and girls’ football squads are currently the only squads which train all year round. Once selected, your space is not guaranteed permanently for the year. Pupils must continue to perform at a high level to keep their place.
• All other sport squads usually train for the duration of a half or full term. These squads will match up to the competition calendar with training leading towards competition and ending once competitions have taken place.

How does a child lose their place?

• If pupils show repeated poor behaviour and/or attitudes, they risk losing their place for a fixed period of time.
• We follow the school’s Behaviour Policy.  Escalation includes the issue of verbal warnings, sending a Red Letter home, meeting a pupil and their parents, setting improvement targets and monitoring through a session by session report card before recommending exclusion from the squad to the Head teacher.
• It is the Head teacher’s decision to exclude or ‘drop’ a pupil from a squad.
• A pupil has every opportunity to change their behaviour or attitude and is encouraged to make improvement.

How do you manage ‘A’, ‘B’ or ‘C’ teams?

• In both football squads, every child will represent the school in competition at some point in the year. This means that where possible children will compete as part of a ‘B’ or ‘C’ team against teams of similar abilities from other schools.
• In other sports, ‘B’ or ‘C’ teams will only compete if competitions allow it. Unfortunately, not all competitions accommodate the entry of more than one team so this is not always possible.

Will my child definitely represent the school if chosen to train as part of a sports squad?

• Unfortunately there can be no guarantees of this. Some competitions only allow entry of one team. This means that competition teams must be selected from squads.  If not selected, pupils’ have benefitted from extra-curricular training sessions.

What happens if my child doesn’t get a place first time?

• However, on the majority of occasions if a child misses out on squad selection they will simply have to wait for the next squad selection session.

What if my child’s sports coach from outside of school says they should be playing for a school team?

• Although it is great that your child is playing well for their team outside of school, this has no bearing on whether they are selected for a school team.
• School teams are selected by school staff and based on performances and abilities shown in school.
• We recognise sporting achievement beyond school through our Sporting Stars arrangements.