Network Activities

It is noteworthy that three of our members (Dr Rachel Sandford, Dr Oliver Hooper and Dr Julie Stirrup) have worked - with colleagues - in partnership with UNESCO this year on the authoring of their Global Quality Physical Education Report. This is a landmark publication that provides an update on the status of the subject globally and has already been shared internationally. Presentations on this work have been shared at previous ECERs and will likely be shared at future ones as publications are developed.

Beyond this, we continue to promote NW18 and to ensure that it remains connected to other local and international organisations and their respective special interest groups in the broad field of sport pedagogy (e.g., AIESEP, BERA, SERA, AARE, AERA, CEREPS). Our members – and, in particular, our convenors - take active roles in many of these wider organisations and special interest groups and, in doing so, ensure that NW18 is promoted.

Our members contribute to a range of international journals in the broad field of sport pedagogy, with several members holding roles such as Editors, Associate Editors or Review Editors for these publications. These journals include: Sport, Education and Society, Physical Education and Sport Pedagogy, European Physical Education Review, British Educational Research Journal, Qualitative Research in Sport Exercise and Health, and Journal of Teaching in Physical Education. We actively encourage our members to publish in these - and other - journals in the field and to organise special issues based on topics that have been focused on during ECERs.

We are pleased that this year three of our members (Dr Julie Stirrup, Dr Shirley Gray and Dr Oliver Hooper) have organised a special issue within Sport, Education and Society on Border Crossings in Health and Physical Education: Policy, Curriculum and Pedagogy. This relates to work that has been presented within NW18 at ECERs over a number of years and is due to be published in late 2025.

In addition to journal publications, there we have also had discussions about developing some of the conference presentations into EERA blog posts.

Finally, it is worth noting that our members have also led and contributed to an edited book (by Dr Fiona Chambers, Dr Rachel Sandford, Dr Oliver Hooper and Dr Lee Schaefer) on Research with Children and Young People in Physical Education and Youth Sport which published in late 2023. This was the result of a previous Network Development Project led by NW18.

NW18 has much planned for the forthcoming year including submitting an application for a Network Project. This will focus on ‘Physical Education Curriculum Learning across European Borders’ and will seek to facilitate cross-border dialogue among researchers and Initial Teacher Education (ITE) practitioners in physical education from across Europe to support critical thinking and to begin to re-imagine physical education for a more socially-just future.

Additionally, we will look to have a Special Call for ECER 2025 centred on ‘Visions for the Future of Physical Education and Sport Pedagogy’.

We will also request to change the name of NW18 – to the Physical Education and Sport Pedagogy Network and nominate a new honorary member over the course of the year.