My friend Eileen Alexander, who has died aged 102, made a great contribution to physical education both nationally and internationally. She was a pioneer in education, an astute businesswoman, a philanthropist and a good friend. Her motto was "excellence as standard".
Her roots were in Yorkshire but it was at the North London Collegiate school that she discovered a passion for hockey and physical education. After training as a teacher at Dartford, Kent, she taught at two schools before moving to Homerton College, Cambridge. During the second world war she became a major with the Auxiliary Territorial Service, responsible, among other duties, for training PT instructors. On her return to Homerton, she was appointed deputy principal and then became a schools inspector. The principal of Homerton, Alice Skillicorn, recognising Eileen's teaching skills, then steered her to become principal of Bedford Physical Training College for Women in 1951.