Best Schools - Independent schools join with DfE to support more swimming partnerships

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Independent schools join with DfE to support more swimming partnerships

Damian Hinds MP, Secretary of State for Education, aims to raise children's swimming ability by joining with the Independent Schools Council to encourage more schools to share their facilities.

Mr Hinds acknowledged that many private schools already shared their pools, but called for more to follow suit. He said: ‘As a parent, I want my children to enjoy swimming as part of an active lifestyle, and as Education Secretary, I want to make sure our children grow up safe and water-confident.

‘That’s why I wanted to partner with the Independent Schools Council to get more private schools to offer up their pools, teachers or training to their neighbouring local state schools.’

Mr Hinds added: ‘Many independent schools are already doing this but others can and must do more to help every child in their community. And as these partnerships develop, I hope to see some healthy competition between and within schools so that children can not only have the health benefit of swimming, but the team spirit and personal development that comes from competitive sport.’

Barnaby Lenon, chairman of the Independent Schools Council, said: ‘Swimming is a life skill which helps develop fitness and for many people leads to a lifetime of enjoyment.

‘We are happy to join the Secretary of State in promoting awareness and encouraging more of these schemes across the country so that children from all kinds of schools can enjoy the health benefits of swimming and can be safe in and around water.

The difference between going to the University of Oxford or to Oxford Brookes lies to a large extent in our DNA, according to a study.

For the study, published in the journal Scientific Reports, a team from King’s College London looked at 3,000 pairs of twins, both identical and non-identical.

The study has found that 57 per cent of the distribution of offers to students can be explained by their genes.

The research also showed that genes explained half the difference in whether or not people went to university at all, as well as the grades they got when they arrived.

The findings are the latest to demonstrate that there is DNA strong heritable component to academic success, building on other work showing that genes also partly explain achievement at GCSE and A level.