Women and girls across the UK want to be more active, but numerous barriers are holding them back. In this article, ConnectSport reporter Dorthe Berger speaks to grassroots groups and national partners about how the significant gender gap in sport and physical activity can be closed.
It is a sad fact that girls’ enjoyment of PE (Physical Education) decreases as they progress through their education.
In 2016, the Youth Sport Trust’s ‘Girls Active’ survey found that 74% of girls enjoyed PE. However, this figure has since dropped to 64%, while 86% of boys still enjoy PE according to the 2023 survey.
Wendy Taylor, the Trust’s National Manager for women and girls, notes: “The statistic that stands out for me is the percentage of girls that tell us their period stops them from being active, which is the top barrier of 49% of secondary school girls.”
The most common barriers reported by girls and women include lack of confidence, feeling self-conscious while being watched by others, concerns about appearance, menstruation for girls, and time management for women.
INITIATIVES
To help get more girls active, Youth Sport Trust have been running the ‘Girls Active’ programme since 2015 in order “to foster girls’ participation in PE, sport and physical activity”.
But it’s not just national organisations that work on this issue, many local or grassroots groups have been advocating for more female participation in different ways, and ConnectSport is dedicated to highlighting their important work.
Ella Williams, the 28-year-old founder of ‘Our Goal’ which encourages physical activity for girls, is very familiar with the barriers that girls face. She was a keen footballer as a child but fell out of love with sports during her teenage years.
“I became more self-conscious,” Ella told ConnectSport. “Just a few girls were playing football at the time, and I started to care more about how I looked. I wanted to do my hair and make-up and that didn’t fit with what we were doing at football.
“By the time I turned 15, I completely dropped out of football. The same happened with PE, that has always been my favourite subject, I just didn’t want to be part of it. I felt exposed in my PE kit and didn’t like people watching me.”
CHANGE
In her teenage years, Ella went “from being a really sporty child, to doing no physical activity.” However, everything changed in her second year at University.
“When I was 19, I ended up playing a football match. I didn’t really want to play, but they needed a player, and I have not looked back since. I was like ´why have I missed these four years of my life not playing?” she explains.
After graduating from University, she worked in various football-related roles, including chief researcher for the film COPA-71 about the 1971 Women’s World Cup in Mexico, which is the most attended women’s sporting event in history. This experience deepened her understanding of the gender gap in sports.
At the same time Ella finished her role as chief researcher in 2022, Women in Sport, the national charity which seeks to make a change in sport for women and girls, came out with a report stating that 43% of girls drop out of sport in their teenage years.
“I identified with that, because that is exactly what happened to me. I just don’t see enough being done about it. So, I was like ‘I’m going to set up a business and try and solve it myself!” she said.
In July 2023, Ella created ‘Our Goal’ and is now working with secondary schools to identify and support girls that are disengaging with PE.
PARTICIPATION
The disengagement in sport and activity persists as girls grow into women, and currently 39% of women fail to get enough exercise, compared to 35% of men.
Carol Bates, the founder of the female football project ‘Crawley Old Girls’, did the opposite of Ella. She was active throughout her teenage years but stopped participating in any activities at age 19, despite her huge passion for football since childhood.
She engaged with the sport in every possible way, except playing, as she belonged to the ‘missed generation’ of women and girls banned from playing football. Although the Football Association lifted the ban in 1971, it took years before Carol, now 58, stepped onto the pitch.
“Our football community foundation was trying to get girls to play, and advertising a session aged 14 plus. Since I really wanted to have a little kick about, I asked what the maximum age was, and they said 25. At that time, I was 48,” she explains.
It was a non-starter - but that didn’t stop Carol. She reached out to the person in charge and sought funding to organise a programme for older women to play football.
CREATION
The project was the first of its type in the country, so the English Football League’s charitable arm had discussions regarding the funding, but then ultimately approved it.
“I just advertised it on my Facebook page,” explains Carol. “We started with 10 women, and next week we had more coming. It was the best thing ever.
“This was my thing I absolutely loved doing. It changed my life!”
In April 2015, Crawley Old Girls came to life. Today, there are six sessions a week, where the youngest woman is 25 and the oldest is 79.
Carol explains: “Crawley Old Girls is all about being a safe space for women to get active, so they can come along and be themselves. If I could tell you how many women who come along to start with and they’re shy and quiet, and in a couple of years, you see their confidence grow. That’s through being in a safe and non-judgmental environment.”
FUTURE
Wendy Taylor, from Youth Sport Trust, has reflected on the future of female sports. “I think there’s a lot more discussion and recognition around women and girls and that provision, and for me personally that’s a movement in the right direction,” she observes.
“But equally there’s a long way to go, whether that’s in elite sports or on a grassroots participation level.”
Both Ella and Carol believe it is very important for women and girls to see the benefits of activity, both mental and physical, and they have no plans of slowing down soon.
“I want to do more preventative work with girls that are in their last years of primary school,” says Ella.
“Rather than undo something that’s already done, we can go a little bit younger and prevent girls to get to that stage of struggling with PE. That’s something I want to look at alongside working with teenagers.”
“I think there needs to be more encouragement,” Carol adds. “It is important to just do it for fun. You don’t have to be good at any sport to do it.
“We have got thousands playing football now, but there’s still loads more that we’ve got to get playing. I don’t really watch a lot of telly - I just sit on the laptop and think about what we can do next!”
