Summer fun: A ceremony is held at Shek Kip Mei Park Sports Centre announcing the extension of the sportACT award scheme into the holidays as the Summer Active Challenge.

The sportACT award scheme has encouraged 17,267 primary and secondary students to engage in at least 18 hours of sports activities in eight-week periods.

Launched by the Leisure & Cultural Services Department at the start of the 2006-07 school year, the result was unveiled at a ceremony today at Shek Kip Mei Park Sports Centre announcing the extension of the scheme into the summer holidays as the Summer Active Challenge.

Gold, silver and bronze award certificates were issued according to the amount of time each student participated - 30 hours for gold, 24 for silver and 18 for bronze.

Of the 17,267 students, 296 were awarded two or more medals. In one school, 86% of students received awards. Forty-six schools that saw 25% or more of its students receive sportACT certificates received Active School Awards.

A total of 185 schools with 127,329 students taking part signed up for the sportACT Award Scheme and pledged to support their students in their efforts to reach the goals.

Speaking at the ceremony, Community Sports Committee Student Sport Activities Co-ordinating Subcommittee Convener Fan Kam-ping called on students to plan their sports activities during the summer holidays against sportACT benchmarks and continue to make sport part of their daily lives.

The sportACT award scheme is one of the subsidiary programmes of the School Sports Programme funded by the department.