Today will be remembered as a milestone moment in Sydney Catholic Schools’ sports history, when 38 schools across 256 teams took part in the system’s inaugural Thursday afternoon inter-school sports competition.

Across 27 different Sydney venues, a flurry of whistles and buzzers signalled the start of the inter-school sports competition.

For the first time in Sydney Catholic Schools’ history every secondary school student was given the opportunity to compete against their peers in an organised conference format that will culminate in a Sydney wide Championship Final every school term.

Getting this weekly competition off the ground has been over 12 months in the making.

“We have built this new Catholic sporting competition so that every student, in every one of our schools, has opportunities to compete at a level which challenges them,” said Damien Kerr, Manager Pre to Post Sport at Sydney Catholic Schools.

“Our aim is that this competition will grow into the strongest underage sporting competition in the country” – Damien Kerr

Basketball action on day one of the Sydney Catholic Schools’ Thursday afternoon inter-school sports competition.

The power of sport

Sport and physical activity play an undeniably significant role in the holistic education and wellbeing of all students. 

By launching this inter-school sports competition, Sydney Catholic Schools aims to reignite and reimagine sport and provide positive opportunities for students of all ages and abilities to increase their social skills, independence, teamwork, problem solving and resilience. 

Olivia Cleary, a Year 9 student from Brigidine College Randwick, looked forward to adding the weekly sporting competition to her school diary.

“This is really exciting,” Olivia said.

“I was a bit nervous about playing, because we have never had a competition like this before… but I think …