FAQs - Charges

Fees directly fund qualified, specialist external coaches, allowing us to maintain appropriate student-to-coach ratios, and these vary by sport. This ensures every student receives high-quality feedback to aid technical development.

Yes, WIS teachers will remain central to our many parts of our sports programme. While external specialists lead the technical coaching and matchday fixtures, a WIS teacher will still oversee safeguarding and manage team logistics -  at least as a point of contact. Where possible they will be present at training and fixtures but due to the volume of hours across sports, this is not guaranteed.

All external providers are bound by strict service provider agreements (SPAs) regarding coaching standards and conduct. The Director of Sport and Vice Principal conduct regular reviews, and parents can submit direct feedback to report any operational issues. Session drop-ins will be conducted by WIS staff, and we have systems in place with coaching teams for reporting and discussing issues arising.

Reviews are undertaken of coaching provision and tender processes for contracts are conducted to ensure the best quality of provision, with the most recent example being basketball.

We have a quality assurance process underpinned by active monitoring by the PHE and Sports department. If coaching standards fall short of expectations these are addressed immediately with the providers through dialogue and meetings, and in the event our expectations are not met we have the contractual flexibility to replace external personnel.

Fees apply selectively only to sports requiring external coaches for training, fixtures, and supervision. Where possible some programmes will remain free of charge but this is established on a sport-by-sport basis. 

Many non-sport CAS activities already have charges attached, particularly those with external provision, in order to allow them to run.

Yes. We will offer a two-session trial period at the start of the term. Payments will then be processed unless a student withdraws from the activity.

WIS is committed to inclusivity. Parents can contact the school's finance office directly to discuss any issues arising. In addition, leveraging the economy of scale allows WIS to keep the charges as low as possible. 

The school sports programme has run significantly over budget for a number of years. While WIS has historically subsidised this deficit, absorbing these rising operational costs is no longer sustainable without causing knock-on impacts on other curricular and resource areas of the school. The introduction of these fees is a strategic decision to bring the sports programme back within its allocated budget, protecting our core educational offerings. This approach aligns with broader ESF group policy.

Since 23/24 we have increased CAS and training hours from ~20 to ~60, and fixtures from ~240 to around ~500. We have over 800 students participating regularly in sports CAS activities. Meeting this scale, and more importantly demand, with purely school-based resources is no longer operationally sustainable if we wish to keep offering year round training and competitive opportunities. 

Yes. Fees directly offset the cost of professional coaches for training and fixtures, facility hire for relevant sports, external tournament entry fees, and transport to fixtures. No profit is generated from these fees.

Our absolute priority is to build a sports programme that is stable and sustainable. While alternative avenues like corporate sponsorships, grants, or alumni support are often proposed, they are unpredictable and unlikely to make a meaningful impact on the forecasted spend of the CAS and sports programme. Researching, securing, and managing these types of funding structures requires massive administrative oversight and a level of dedicated labour resource that we simply do not have available within our current school staffing structure.

Participation data is reviewed on a rolling basis by the Director of Sport and CAS Coordinator. Fees are structured on a strict cost-recovery basis and are supplementary to the school subsidy. Any future adjustment would require SLT approval.

A comprehensive, termly training and fixture calendar will be published on the Sports Guide prior to the CAS sign-up window opening. Discussions with the Director of Sport are encouraged in the event of specific activity clashes.

The ISSFHK seasons and age group sports are designed not to cause sports clashes, and these generally dovetail with the HKSSF seasons, minimising clashes.

The Sports Guide contains information for all families and new Year 7 students will have an introduction to CAS in their first week. This outline expectations, scheduling, pathway choices, and tips to avoid overcommitment.

We are committing to keeping costs as low as possible through subsidy to ensure highly active student-athletes are not financially penalised for representing WIS across multiple disciplines.

To foster team unity, tactical cohesion, and fair selection, representation in WIS competitive fixtures is dependent on attending WIS training. Exceptional cases (e.g., club training and fixture clashes, elite national representation) will be reviewed by the Director of Sport. Certain individual sports will be decided on a case-by-case basis.

If a squad does not reach the minimum numbers required for a viable programme of training sessions, the CAS will be cancelled, and parents will not be charged.

No. The termly fee is a flat contribution to the overheads of running the sports programme across the academic term, rather than a pay-as-you-go session rate. Because we must commit to seasonal overheads in advance - such as professional coach retainers, facility hire, and tournament entry fees - we are unable to offer refunds, make-up classes, or credits for sessions cancelled due to factors beyond our control. Where possible, we will always look to adapt sessions or use indoor spaces to keep training running.

Our competitive sports programme is dynamic, and hosting fixtures across multiple age groups and sports requires a degree of operational flexibility. There will be occasions where scheduled training sessions need to be adjusted or superseded by fixture hosting responsibilities. We make every effort to plan calendars carefully to avoid these clashes, but where modifications are necessary, they will be communicated as early as possible. We thank parents and students for their adaptability, as hosting matches is essential to providing representative pathways for our teams.

While our guiding philosophy remains firmly rooted in inclusivity—ensuring every student has opportunity and access to WIS sports—our coaching teams will design and differentiate training sessions to target specific ability levels. This differentiation ensures that competitive squads receive the high-intensity tactical and technical coaching required to excel, while developmental groups can build confidence and skills in a supportive, high-quality environment. Where teams share a session (e.g U14A&B, or U16&U20) coaching teams provide opportunities for team players to practice together as a team.

By using professional external coaches for our sessions, where necessary training will feature advanced tactical work and position-specific coaching comparable to external club academies. This will depend on the overall ability of the individual and the wider group, but we expect sessions to target different groups of players with different activities or drills.