Help!@

I totally agree w/ the above statement of the article. Skills, teamwork, and positive social interactions along with making it enjoyable is the key to lead students to a healthy and productive lifestyle. We learn in college about physiology, bio mechanics, sociology,and history of sport in college, but by teaching these in class, it takes up time and lowers the MVPA rate. Get the kids moving and then we can incorporate these issues. While performing skills of a sport, we can use bio-mechanics to correct techniques, teach about the history during cool downs, etc.

Schools, rather than being a solution, contribute to the problem. We typically only give our students 20 minutes to eat and the food selection is too often less than desirable. Students don't have an opportunity to eat at the right times nor with healthy snacks. Having seen health curriculum I tend to agree with the comments made at this site: http://www.physical-education-institute.com/his.... Schools can and must provide lots of opportunities for physical activity and to learn about the health and healing, but they do need to be more receptive to current trends and never to forget to teach students in the skill of discernment and truth seeking. Too often we just give students one side of the story and avoid any “controversy”.

As a health and physical educator for over 40 years, my priority has been one of developing good Physical Education Programs and there are many ways to accomplish this task. I was excited when I had the opportunity to write the first grant for PEP. Unfortunately, my school district was hesitant because matching funds needed to be attached and we needed to present data to establish a need. True, these were roadblocks but the passion for Physical Education for all students prevailed. My next step was to develop the district Physical Education: A New Vision newsletter and a Web Site.
http://www.lnybugspublication.org

In 2009, Illinois was awarded a few PEP grants, but they were not to school districts. Instead they went to organizations. This concerns me because universities and school districts should be considered first. The PEP grant should be a catalyst in promoting collaboration between universities and school districts. For example, a previous PEP grant was awarded to three Illinois universities and a school district.

Some legislation from the Federal Government is well-meaning, but our legislators do not realize that the problem they are trying to address has been prevalent for many years. In many instances, reliance on surveys does not substantiate a cause and effect conclusion. From my perspective, the Wellness Act Policy is now taking up space on a school district shelf. The real purpose of this Act completely escapes me and I served on the school district Wellness Policy Committee as Chairperson of Physical Activity. We finally came up with physical activity goals that did not address state and national Physical Education Standards. Physical activity is not the same as Physical Education and wellness is not the same as Health Education. Illinois has a unique situation because the Physical Development and Health Goals (now referred to as standards) combine Health Education and Physical Education.

This leads to my final point. The National Health Education Standards provide an excellent foundation for the development of a Comprehensive Health Education Program in the schools. We need this program in our schools. Do we need to take from the PEP grant in order to satisfy this necessity? I would hope this does not happen.

Students are under enormous pressure from family, peers, and instructors to compete for scholarships, admissions, and, of course, place in the job market. They often see education as a rung in the ladder to success, and not an active process valuable in itself. Because of this, students tend to focus on the end results of their research, rather than the skills they learn in doing it.

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