You are right, if this worked as it is supposed to. In the state I live in, we are in the state that requires one of the most hours of PE per student per K through 12. YET, IL does not have a lower obestiy rate, a lower heart disease rate, a lower cancer rate or any other health benefit better than other states. In fact Chicago is one of American's "fattest" cities. (I did this research for a letter I wrote to the school board to help get MORE music and art in the schools and less PE.) IF more PE worked Illinois should be the healthiest state in the Union, we aren't, which shows that simply MORE hours of PE per 13 years of education is useless. IF they really concentrated on Health and Fitness, than they could use these hours well. But when I was in Grammer School we had PE every day, all 9 years. In High School, we had PE all four years, every day. We aren't healthier than people in states who have meager or no PE programs, so, at least in IL, the PE mandatory hours are not working.
I was healthiest when I was in band, actually. Marching band is the healthiest thing for a person. It's a competition, but not the kind of competition that results in broken bones and raw athletic talent. Ah.. how I loved it. I'll admit, I'm overweight, but lack of PE didn't do that, it's a combination of genetics and thyroid problems. We were required to take a combonation PE/ Health class (a quarter of each) for a semester because we're on block scheduling so we only have 4 classes a day and change classes the next semester. All we did was run, and run, and run. Completely boring but they didn't time us. I really lucked out, we never had any kind of embarassing PE stuff to do. Really the only thing that could be embarassing was running bleachers, which my friends and I would always be last because we walked... and only because we have steep, small steps on the bleachers and it's pretty high, and at 14 when you're still trying to grow into your limbs, it would be all too easy to fall down the bleachers running. So yeah.. PE would be so much better in high school if there was an element of yoga to it. Maybe it's just me, but I overload myself with stuff which ends up with me being completely stressed out for the 2nd half of every semester and most of my friends are the same way. PE would have served a better purpose to help soothe and calm us down, rather than be just mindless running in order to get a credit.
Wow, that's just completely shocking. I'm so glad that PE isn't a requirement for me to graduate. My school changed the requirements for graduation this year, though, and for the students in the grade below me, PE will be necessary to graduate. What amazes me is that PE is worth the same amount as any Science or Math or English credit. In all the years that I was required to take PE before high school, I was embarassed, and hated it, and was quite traumatized. I had excellent grades and my average was always dragged down by my low PE marks. I'm not overweight. In fact, I'm very healthy, so I don't see why I should have been forced into taking such a terrible subject. So much money is put into it, and not into the arts. I'm a band girl myself, and I'm sick of seeing money going towards sports. Maybe it's better that those kids were taken out of such a corrupt system?
I agree, Icarus. I think if school have PE programs, the "grades" should just be "pass or fail" based on efffort, not acheivement. And those grades should NOT be included in the GPA. We need more Art and Music in our schools, which is always the first thing cut. My kid's Jr High had ONE Art teacher and ONE Music teacher for TWO schools to share. Yet both Jr Highs in out town had FOUR, (count them FOUR) FULL TIME PE teachers, for a total of EIGHT PE teachers for the District. Ridiculous.
My school is actually pretty decent with the arts, but the band doesn't get NEAR enough funding as it should, so to participate in band you have to pay over $700 a year. Football players, on the other hand, only pay $100 because of all the funding that goes to them. In a school of 2500, we have 2 band directors (3 bands), 1 chorus teacher, 3 art teachers, 2 drama teachers (1 drama, 1 tech theatre), and 10 PE teachers as well as about 20 more coaches who "teach" regular classes. No, I'm not kidding. We also have a culinary arts kitchen that is newly renovated with the top of the line systems which is better than most upscale restaurants. Yet the band is still using 15 year old dented sousaphones and french horns and near rotting student model bass clarinets. Then again, we do have 12 or so language teachers which enables us to have 7 levels on Spanish! Including 2 AP Spanishes! But we only have one language lab when we need at least 2 more. While we've asked for another language lab, we've been refused because they "had" to build a new matrix board on the football field. Jesus Christ...
