There isn’t a boarding school in Britain that doesn’t have a population of overseas pupils. For many, this is 15-20% of the school roll, and often a significantly bigger proportion of the boarding community. As the cost of boarding has soared, many schools have secured their future by looking overseas – typically by turning their attention eastwards, towards Asia and Russia.
Overseas pupils provide a problem for the Games programme. In the early years of the invasion, overseas pupils were a sufficiently small number to be conveniently ignored. They existed on the margins of the physical life of a school. Occasional boys and girls engaged with traditional games; most accepted the need to fulfil minimum requirements to stay out of trouble. But then, the numbers grew and became too large for a school to conveniently ignore.
There is a central dilemma, which most schools have never satisfactorily addressed on a philosophical level: have overseas pupils signed up for a traditional British education, with an inevitable experience of culturally significant, outdoor team games? Or have schools diversified their client base, and need to accept the need for similar expansion of their games offer? Few schools have spent time debating this question, with a result that for many pupils, the quality of the games experience is mixed – or low.
There is an irony that these pupils are among many schools’ most valuable clients - amongst the very highest contributors to fee income. Unlike most other service industries, this does not entitle them to the highest quality offer.
Often there is complicity on behalf of the children. Many cultures attach less importance to exercise – and particularly to apparently mystifying outdoor games. Some of these children would happily take no exercise, and many schools are happy to make minimum demand, whilst pouring their resources into pupils who show enthusiasm for teams in traditional activities. Every school can point to a small number of “successes” – overseas pupils who conform to the norm, and play in games teams. But they are a significant minority. The physical health of overseas pupils is rarely seen as a priority, and the link between physical activity and their drive for academic success is infrequently made.
So, what is the answer? Certainly, an introductory experience of team games would appear an appropriate dimension of an English school education. Sensitively positioned, and carefully introduced, some pupils will be engaged by these games, and go on to be involved in the conventional programme. Beyond this, a range of activities reflecting the cultures of origin, will engage many more. The key is the quality of this provision: whether it is demanding, offers coaching and meaningful, regular competition as well as recreational opportunity. Sadly, the Badminton is too often supervised by a conscripted teacher confined to the margins of the programme and executing the minimum requirements of the role: complete the register, give out equipment and sit in the corner with marking. In most areas of school life, it is accepted that pupil engagement is a reflection of teacher enthusiasm and imaginative delivery. Rare are the vibrant and exciting sessions of Basketball, Badminton and Table Tennis. But not unique; schools that have dedicated themselves to providing high quality in these sessions, have usually found that pupils have responded.
The central question is how much schools care: whether their concern for the physical health of overseas pupils is equal to their concern for the income they produce.
