New Director of Sport at Hampshire Collegiate School

Published by Embley on Monday 17th of March 2014

Hampshire Collegiate School (HCS) is pleased to introduce their new Director of Sport, Mr Andrew Egford who joined the school at the start of the spring term.

Andrew's role at HCS is to oversee all areas of sport and PE curriculum. Part of this role is to co-ordinate all the fixtures for the HCS. Andrew is also responsible for developing all sporting facilities on HCS's 130 acre campus.

'Our aim is to provide opportunity for all pupils to have an enjoyable and challenging experience with sport at HCS,' explained Andrew.

'Another part of my role is to oversee the team of full and part time teaching staff. There are currently eight full-time staff and three Prep School staff, who work alongside two external hockey coaches, two London Irish Community rugby coaches, one tennis coach, one golf coach and other part-time multi-sport coaches.' he said.

Andrew has exciting plans for future developments. 'My philosophy is that all pupils should find an interest for life-long participation in sport by the time they leave HCS. This means offering a full and broad experience, with high quality coaching, that enables pupils to develop at their own rate. I aim to increase participation levels in golf, tennis, trampoline, and orienteering, as well as continuing with the development of the School's already strong 'team sports' of rugby, netball, cricket and hockey. I am also looking to establish an Australian Rugby exchange programme for our Senior School pupils.'

Andrew is married and has two young children. When not at work Andrew has a broad range of sporting interests that include surfing, golf, skiing, cycling and cricket. He is also fascinated in the psychology behind teaching and how a pupil's mind is developed from an early age.

Andrew has been in teaching since 2007, after graduating from Exeter University. He joins HCS from a boarding school in Tavistock, Devon where he was Head of PE and boarding house master. Prior to this he played rugby and was a community rugby coach with Plymouth Albion RFC, Pontypool RFC and Exeter Chiefs RFC.