Tailored school interventions

PASSPORT is a research study looking at how to make school-based physical activity programmes that are tailored to individual Primary schools. We are creating a tool for schools to assess their physical activity provision and needs, identify any areas that can be improved, and develop bespoke programmes to support pupils’ activity. We are working with Primary schools in the wider-Bristol area to develop and trial this tool.

School-centred approach

Working with schools, we aim to create a tool works within the current school system. We want to assess what a school already has and does well, as well as any constraints a school has, and build on this to complement their current provision. This way each school will have a bespoke intervention, chosen by the school, that is suitable to their school and community.

Stepped-wedge trial

Once this tool is developed, we will trial the approach to measure its success, to see if pupil physical activity levels change. To match this novel flexible intervention, we are designing a ‘stepped-wedge’ trial, a more complex evaluation which has not been used in this setting before. In this study design, every school in the study will receive the intervention at different times. This means that as well as comparing control (those that receive no intervention) and intervention schools, we can compare the same school before and after the intervention. It also allows us to look at whether the effect of the intervention changes over time, for example, as new elements become embedded within the school culture.