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Tackling barriers to sport and physical activity – responding to your Pulse feedback
By: Communications
Huge thanks to all students at UEA who are continuing to make their voices heard by completing our weekly pulse surveys. Back in November, we reported your responses on sport and exercise, particularly on the barriers to participating – so here’s an update on what’s being actioned because of your feedback to the Pulse and NPS surveys!
Cost
One of the key barriers to participating in sport and physical activity at UEA was cost. Sport and physical activity are integral parts of community life at UEA for students and staff alike, and uea+sport are committed to providing opportunities for everyone to get involved. Firstly, we want to make sure that students know about the full range of activities available through the Active Campus programme, as a lot of these are cheap – and sometimes free! You do not need to pay any form of membership fee to uea+sport to participate in the Active Campus programme. The programe includes:
• Drop-in sport for only £1 per session, including badminton, volleyball, swimming and football
• Group exercise classes for only £2, including Zumba, body balance and restorative yoga
• The Ziggurat Challenge, which is free for all students and staff and actively encourages friendly competition between all genders
• Navigate Norfolk day trips for only £5 which includes travel to and from campus – upcoming trips include the Great Eastern Pingo Trail and Sheringham Park
• Wellbeing dog walks on campus every Wednesday for £1
Another point raised was that having to pay for the student Sportspark membership upfront was off-putting and too expensive. This year, students have been able to split this payment into two instalments to make it more affordable – but based on your feedback, they’re continuing to look at other options such as monthly direct debits. We’ll let you know when there’s further updates!
Some also raised cost as being a barrier to joining sports clubs. Sports club memberships are already heavily subsidised to make it as affordable as possible for students – for example, student sport provision is estimated to cost £1.35 million for academic year 2021-22, which includes expenditure for facility and equipment hire, coaching, insurance, travel, staff and more. The University pays for 71% of this cost, with the other 29% covered by student fees and memberships. They’ve looked into split payment options for uea+sport membership (SAM), which is currently not possible as this is collected through the SU using their MSL platform, but will continue to be explored
Uea+sport have also worked out that the average cost for a sports club session is only £1.36! This is an average across all clubs (including uea+sport membership) based on running 3 sessions a week over 30 weeks. This average cost per session is even less for those students who join more than one club. uea+sport and the uea(SU) are working collaboratively on a project of financial transparency of club sport, specifically looking into the ‘hidden’ costs of certain sports and how grant funding is split between each club, as well as a comparison with club sport programmes at other universities. More info can be found in the Cost of Sport Statement.
Inclusivity
Another barrier raised by students was inclusivity. As well as wanting more sessions and clubs for those with mental and physical disabilities, students also raised not feeling welcome in established clubs if they were new to a sport and feeling put-off by focus on alcohol-based sports socials and initiations.
There’s a range of initiatives already in place to make sport and physical activity as inclusive as possible, including:
• Bespoke committee training around inclusivity, including Disability Confidence training and How to Support a Friend mental health workshops
• uea(su) resources on how to make clubs and societies as inclusive as possible
• Active Campus programme designed especially with inclusivity and accessibility in mind
• Ziggurat Challenge programme features activities such as Boccia and sitting volleyball.
• 3rd year PESH placement student (1 day a week) in the ‘Inclusive Sport Officer Role’
• Adapted club training sessions
• 3 Do Something Different taster sessions for clubs each year for students who want to try something new – plus, most clubs will let you attend the first session for free
uea+sport are always looking at what more they could do, however, so this year they’re gathering insight and demand to feed into an inclusivity strategy and initiatives to be in place for academic year 2022-23. They’re also planning an inclusive sports day for the end of semester 2 – more details available soon!
Regarding alcohol-based socials, uea+sport encourage clubs via committee training to offer non-alcoholic socials too, and uea(su) also have their A Night To Remember campaign for clubs and societies. Uea+sport would like to reassure students that initiations/welcome rituals are not permitted at UEA and they do a lot of proactive work with clubs to prevent these from happening. However, they’re currently working with the UEA Disciplinary team and uea(su) to look at a review of the discipline codes of conduct to have clearer rules and sanctions in place for those who break the rules.
You talk, we listen, things happen
Don’t forget to keep taking the weekly surveys to let us know how you’re getting on and providing your insights into the student experience at UEA – as shown above, your responses are genuinely driving change and influencing decisions made across the entire University. They’re sent to all taught students’ UEA email addresses every Monday.
If you’ve got any specific feedback, or you’d just like to let us know what you think of the responses above, you can also leave anonymous ideas and feedback through the We’re Listening platform.
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