AQW 9129/22-27

Mr Nick Mathison
Alliance Party
Strangford

Tabled Date: 19/03/2024
Answered On Date: 29/03/2024
Priority Written: No

Question:
To ask the Minister of Education what percentage of pupils are accessing the recommended two hours per week of statutory curriculum physical education, broken down by (i) primary level; and (ii) post-primary level.

Answer:

My Department monitors the percentage of time schools allocate to Physical Education (PE) via the School Omnibus Survey. The last survey was conducted in 2022 and primary schools and post-primary schools were asked about the time spent per week on the delivery of curricular PE. The primary results are set out in the table below.

Time spent per week	Foundation Stage	Key Stage 1	Key Stage 2
0-59 mins	25.0%	17.5%	13.2%
60-119 mins	60.7%	66.7%	63.2%
120 mins +	14.3%	15.8%	23.7%
No of responding school	112	114	114

Source: School Omnibus Survey 2022 | Department of Education (education-ni.gov.uk)

The 2022 Omnibus Survey was affected by the industrial action short of strike taken by the Northern Ireland teachers' unions. As part of this action, union members were advised not to comply with some data collections undertaken by my Department.

As a result, the response rate for the 2022 Omnibus Survey (21.5%) was significantly below the rate in 2018 (39%). The lower response rate should be borne in mind when making inferences about the primary results in the table above.

Unfortunately, the response rate for post-primaries to the question about the time spent on PE did not meet the response threshold and subsequently it was not possible to categorise the results for the relevant key stages.

The 2023-24 School Omnibus Survey will be issued to schools in September 2024 and will again include questions on the provision of PE in schools. This will help to provide an up-to-date picture of PE provision in our schools.