Miss Cooil - master of positivity

Many of you will know Miss Kim Cooil, 2nd in Charge, PE and games department, has been conducting research as part of her Masters in Education, titled ‘Physical Education: providing females with a positive relationship with their body?’. Miss Cooil has been particularly interested in this subject area since her undergraduate thesis and has been investigating the positive ways in which we encourage girls to pursue sport, and develop positive body image perceptions.

The project highlighted the ways in which PE at our all-girls school provides students with positive experiences; relating to gender ideals, ideas about specific sports and activities, and body image issues. Looking at notions of femininity and masculinity and how these are portrayed, the research looked at the proactive way in which schools can impact students’ ideals for the better. Delving deeper in to the area of body image, Miss Cooil investigated where the ‘ideal’ body image comes from, and the links between these ideals and school-age PE experiences. Miss Cooil enjoyed looking in more detail the positive impact single sex PE has on girls’ experiences of sport and on their lasting perceptions of body image.

Explaining that her interest in the area “has only grown since working in an all-girls school where I see so many girls enjoying PE”, Miss Cooil went on to say, “Physical Education and sport are vital in providing girls with an all-round education as well as learning important life skills, yet so many adolescent girls drop out of physical activity and never return to it.”

Sport is such a vital part of life at this school, Miss Cooil felt it was important to focus her research on this area, and was pleased to report, “one of the things that makes me so excited about sport at St Mary's School, Cambridge is that every girl has an opportunity to take part in curriculum and extra-curricular physical activities. We have so many clubs that the girls freely take part in. An incredible example of this is the 50 girls that turn up to running club each week to positively impact their healthy, active, lifestyles!”

Congratulations to Miss Cooil on passing her Masters in Education with Merit on such a key aspect of well being. Miss Cooil will share more of her research in the end of year magazine, Magnolian, so do look out for the article. In the meantime please see Ms Avery’s take on encouraging girls and women in to sport in her recent blog.