Bedford Physical Education

02/01/2026

Highlights of 2025 - Bedford Sports and Physical Activity Awards. Steph Daniels presenting the young volunteer award sponsored by BPEOSA.

09/12/2025

Bedford Borough's prestigious 'Bedford Sports & Physical Activity Awards 2025' started celebrating its 30th anniversary last night with video messages from many great Bedford sports stars and Borough Award winners from the past like Paula Radcliffe, Tim Foster, Gail Emms and Etienne Stott. The Corn Exchange was packed out with around 400 of Bedford's sporting finest.

BPEOSA sponsors the Young Volunteer Of The Year Award which this year was won by Bodie Christison (Multi Sports). The standard was so high that the judges awarded additional special commendations for Jasamine Bailey (Multi Sports) and Jessica Leach (Hockey). Following the loss of Jan Schofield, Steph Daniels took up the reins this year on behalf of the Association, both as a Judge and Presenter, and here she is at the podium with Jasamine and Jessica and at the podium.

With the focus of the Award we sponsor being on young people and their service to others, it's an ideal category for us to be part of, reflecting, as it does, the ethos of our work.

07/12/2025

Challenging golf and fun times afterwards 🤣

07/12/2025

Dorset Golf trip

07/12/2025

More from the Dorset Golf weekend

05/12/2025

Bedford Old Girls Golf Society (BOGGS) Autumn Tour 2025……. Good to see the BCPE Dance/Sports Acro lectures weren’t wasted !

02/12/2025

Biddy Burgum, the oldest living England international hockey player and Bedford Old Student, died, age 98, on 29th November writes Ange Newton. Biddy played on the right wing for England from 1950-61 and qualified at Bedford in 1948. Biddy was a frequent visitor to Old Students' Day and was one of 3 who attended their 70th Year Out. For the 2018 Annual Report Biddy wrote:

‘I started my college course, under new Principal, Cicely ‘Birdie’ Read, 10 days late as I had broken my left leg during my last week at school jumping beyond the prepared long jump pit on my school sports day!

If you could survive 3 years of Bedford in the 40s you could survive anything, including the dreadful winter of 1947, with snow covering the ground for most of the spring term and temperatures even in our rooms often below freezing. We were always cold, but lectures continued outside, adapting the games to frozen pitches and breaking the ice in the swimming pool for early morning lectures.

The standard of all sports was high at Bedford. I was captain of the tennis team in year 3, and after every match I had to report to Miss Read on how we got on. One match was against Bedfordshire County 1st team and when I said “Sadly we lost” she asked why? I rashly said “Because they were better than us!!” Her reply “They couldn’t have been. You must have played badly!”

College meals were very formal, sitting at long tables for about 10/12 of us with a member of staff at the head. Some staff were easy to talk to, others insisted on no talk about PE during our meals or we sat in silence. This made sharing an informal lunch with other ‘girls’ from my year at Old Students’ Day this year extra special.’

We will miss Biddy's optimism and good cheer.

22/11/2025

There’s now a video available about the making of ‘Stanny’s Stus, Images of Bedford Physical Training College’.

The exhibition is receiving good and enthusiastic visitors, including school children who are enjoying the opportunity to curate their own mini exhibition (a fun part of the exhibition). Yesterday, Bedford College media students were in the gallery, making a film about ‘Stanny’s Stus’ as part of their course work. The exhibition runs till May 31st 2026.

Behind the Scenes: The Making of ‘Stanny’s Stus – Images of Bedford Physical Training College’Step inside the creation of ‘Stanny’s Stus, Images of Bedford P...

03/11/2025

The 'Stanny's Stu's, Images of Bedford Physical Training College' exhibition at The Higgins Bedford was opened yesterday by Antiques Roadshow expert, Siobhan Tyrell, who said " ‘The importance of sharing this hidden history cannot be underestimated. It’s a fantastic exhibition and everyone involved should be congratulated.’ Also attending the opening were the ‘Lost Lionesses’, Chris Lockwood and Leah Caleb, (from the 1971 women's football team who played in the Azteca Stadium Mexico in front of 90,000 spectators) and current England Lacrosse star, Sophia Wise.

02/11/2025

02/11/2025

Great exhibition at the Higgins Museum, Bedford. Opening this week.

31/10/2025

The exhibition ‘Stanny’s Stus Images of Bedford Physical Training College’ opens next week at The Higgins in Bedford and runs till May next year. Featuring almost 100 scanned and enlarged photographs from Bedford PE albums from 1903-48 , the exhibition also has memorabilia from our Archive and includes QR codes to additional information that we like to think have some educational value! There’s also film to watch and you can make history by curating your own exhibition.