Maynard Students Take Part in Master Class with Olympic Sprinter Jeanette Kwakye

10 Feb 2012

Last week British sprinter Jeanette Kwakye visited The Maynard School in Exeter to run an interactive and physical master class with a group of Year 8 and 9 students.

The session was part of the school’s ‘Try a new Olympic Sport’ project which was initiated by PE teacher Rachael Miller as part of the London 2012 Olympics. The Maynard teamed up with Sky Sports ‘Living for Sport’ last year for the project, which gives young people the opportunity to try different Olympic sports that are not necessarily within the PE curriculum. Sports carried out so far at The Maynard include archery, trampolining, handball and waterpolo, and over 20 Maynard students have taken part so far.

As part of the project, Sky Sports assign an inspirational athlete member to each school taking part. Jeanette Kwakye reached the final of the women’s 100m at the Beijing Olympics in 2008. She was the first British woman to do so since 1984 and came sixth, making her the sixth fastest woman in the world. She currently holds the British record for 60m, and in 2008 successfully defended her title of British 100m champion which she won in 2007. Jeanette is now preparing to run on home soil in the London 2012 Olympics.

PE teacher Rachael said, ‘It was so exciting to have Jeanette work with the students and she was extremely inspirational. She spoke to them about the importance of team work, mental endurance and physical fitness in sport, giving specific examples from her own experience, and the girls took part in a number of interactive tasks to demonstrate why these skills are important. Jeanette will be coming back to The Maynard later in the year to spend a whole day working with the students.’