We are extremely lucky to have a spacious and well-kept campus with excellent sporting facilities. We are keen, as a Sports College, to develop community use of our facilities and if you or your associated body would like to find our more please contact Mrs K Fleet, at Devizes School, for costings' and availability, or alternatively click here for full details. 

Unauthorised use and trespass on to the school site causes unnecessary overuse and damage on occasions and we remind our community to respect our boundaries and facilities at all times. Exercising animals on the campus is particularly unpleasant and unnecessary trespass.

We are already blessed with excellent facilities but our Capital Build, which is supported and jointly funded by many local businesses, has provided us with a PE classroom of the future, fitness suite and offices. The classroom of the future has all the latest ICT Equipment, including performance and analysis equipment.

A new leadership structure was put into place in September 2004 to coincide with the launch of Devizes School as a Specialist Sports College. The new structure reflected the increasing demands and roles that the department has to fulfil both across the whole school and in the community. As the school, and in particular the PE department, has expanded since becoming a Sports College, and to fully harmonise the work of the Sports College and the Sports Partnership (which entered Phase 2 in 2006) further refinements to the leadership structure were implemented in September 2007.

The PE Department is a very successful and highly motivated team, already grasping the many benefits that Sports College status brings. The PE Team is highly committed and enthusiastic in enabling students to achieve their true potential in a variety of sports in a safe and challenging environment.

The Department is very fortunate to have several other members of staff involved with the department, helping with teams and the running of clubs. We have a number of coaches involved in delivering both curriculum lessons and extra-curricular clubs and activities as a result of Sports College funding. The department has led the way on OSHL opportunities and September 2007 saw a change in the whole school day and the responsibility for OSHL in the school coming together in a new appointment to develop OSHL throughout the school.

Curriculum

The curriculum in all Key Stages has undergone extensive development over the last few years as a result of Sports College Status. From September 2007 both KS3 and KS4 will receive three fifty minute lessons and therefore meet the PSA target of two hours of high quality PE. The department is already looking to lead the way on the new National Curriculum changes for September 2007 in advance of the official launch in September 2008.

KS3

In Year 7, 8 and 9 pupils will receive three fifty- minute lessons of PE per week, one double and one single. At present they are single sex and of mixed ability in Year 7.  In Years 8 and 9 they are single sex and setted. In addition to these three lessons, all Year 8 students have an additional period of dance, to ensure the full breadth of the National Curriculum is covered.

KS4

In Years 10 and 11 pupils will receive three fifty minute lessons of PE per week. In both years students have the opportunity to choose the activities they wish to follow. One of their two core PE lessons follows a 'Sport Education' theme where students take on different roles within a team. In another of their three lessons students have an extension lesson when they follow an accredited course, including Sports Leadership, Asdan Health & Fitness, GCSE Short Course and Entry Level Certificate.  

GCSE has run for a number of years. The results are well above the national average and some of the best in the school. The OCR syllabus is followed. From September 2005 OCR’s National Certificate in Sport has run and the first year group will be examined this year. GCSE Dance is also part of the options system. 

KS5

In September 2004, the Sixth Form PE afternoon was reintroduced with a choice of further activities on offer including the Sports Leaders Award in Community Level 1. A level PE was introduced five years ago and is now a well established and successful course. The OCR syllabus is again followed. A Level Dance started in September 2005. 

Extra Curricular

Students participate in a wide range of clubs, both at lunchtimes and after school, in many sports including rugby, football, basketball, hockey, netball, cricket, athletics, tennis, rounders and swimming. Sports College continues to see the expansion of this programme with a much more diverse and varied programme of activities including aerobics, trampolining, kick-boxing and scuba-diving. As a consequence of funding from the Sports Partnership, we have also been able to target specific groups who would not normally participate in OSHL activities and provide them with a varied programme of their choice, e.g. Lifestyle Girls programme, skateboarding and Living for Sport. Inter-tutor group events run in Years 7, 8, 9 and 10 at present and are very successful. Trips are organised to many national events and we have excellent links with local clubs and the local Leisure Development Services.  A whole school house system is to be introduced in September 2007.

Facilities

The school has excellent sporting facilities, sharing a site with Devizes Leisure Centre. The shared facilities at the centre include a four lane 25m pool, two squash courts and a fitness suite. School facilities include a new All Terrain Pitch, two artificial cricket wickets, five hard court Tennis/Netball courts/four further hard court netball courts, a sports hall, two gymnasia and extensive playing fields.

Devizes Leisure Centre has recently completed extensive refurbishment and expansion with a £1.9 million budget. In September 2005 our new Sports College Capital Build was opened, incorporating a PE classroom, fitness suite, PE offices and further storage space.

Outreach Work

Our outreach work has been extremely successful in our 5 original partner primary & specialist school, in developing both curriculum PE as was  informal and extra curricular activities.  This success and working close collaboration with the Partnership Primary Schools has resulted in all 10 linked schools being supported by 5 of the PE staff on a weekly basis with the aims of supporting:-

1. The delivery of high quality PE
2. Activities on a school site
3. Activities in a community environment
4. Progression a) gifted and talented
                     b) Competition
5. Leadership and volunteering in PE

Many of our senior students following the Sports Leaders Awards Level 1 are now involved with the schools, culminating in a number of Primary School Sports Festivals hosted at Devizes School.

Sports College

The school has achieved and even surpassed many of its targets originally laid out in the original Sports College Plan. An Ofsted inspection in September 2005 stated "A catalyst for the school's development has been its recent Sports College Status and the benefits of this are already being widely felt, especially in physical education and sport." Many new initiatives have been started, including the Junior Athlete Education Programme, involving our Gifted and Talented pupils. “Thinking Skills” continues to be at the forefront of the department’s work not only to raise standards in PE, but lead the way across other subjects. Healthy Schools status has recently been gained, the school being the first school in Wiltshire to qualify under the new scheme.

We have made significant improvements on the ICT front with extensive software and hardware resources supporting the work of the department, and ICT is now the 2nd target setting subject in the school.

S. E. Marshall - Director of Sport

Sep 2008