Marin Independent Journal
Friday, May 3, 2002

California's Schoolchildren Are Dying to Learn
By Joel Kirsch

Almost to the day a year ago, I authored a Marin Voice article that was published in association with a forum on educational reform that the Mill Valley-based, nonprofit American Sports Institute hosted at Tamalpais High School. The theme of the forum focused on using the positive aspects of sport culture and physical education as models for reforming California's and our nation's schools.

At the Tam High forum, we presented the audience of about 150 legislators, state education officials, educators, parents, students, and general public members with a two-question survey that also appeared in the Marin Voice article. This survey has been presented to thousands of similar people over the last five years. The survey questions are repeated here:

Question 1: "On a scale of 10 to 1, with 10 being totally excited and 1 being totally apathetic, how excited are middle and high school students about going to school for their academic courses only. This does not include the social or extracurricular aspects of school?"

Question 2: "Are kids natural learners or unnatural learners?"

At the forum, the range of responses to the first question was between 2 and 5, with the greatest number of responses being 3. However, everyone said that kids are natural learners. These are the same responses we've received over the years.

If kids are natural learners but the response given most often is a 3, and the range is 2 to 5, the conclusion that people come to is that there is something fundamentally wrong at the core of state's and our nation's educational system.

One outcome of the forum was that ASI was invited by Virginia Strom-Martin, chair of the California State Assembly Education Committee and a forum participant, to make a presentation to her committee this past February 27. Besides the Assembly Education Committee members sitting in on the hearing, state Senator John Vasconcellos, chair of the Senate Education Committee, and East Bay Senator and former teacher Tom Torlakson also participated.

We brought in a variety of people to testify-experts from around the country as well as ASI Directors and staff, and administrators, teachers, and students who have been involved with our educational reform programs. At the hearing, we once again conducted the two-question survey. We even had the Assemblymembers and Senators take part. The results were the same as those of the Tam High forum and everyone else's over the years.

In preparing for the hearing, we did some extensive research. We discovered that not only were most middle and high school students apathetic about their academic courses, but their health and fitness levels have been deteriorating rapidly over the past two decades. And the schools have been unwitting accomplices to this demise. In fact, the very process we use to educate students in our schools is contributing to the children becoming physically unfit, overweight, and obese, which often leads to diabetes, heart disease, and cancer in adults. The college preparatory curriculum mandated by the University of California and California State University systems contain no physical or bodily domain requirements. As a result, college prep has become, for many, the unintended equivalent of disease prep. Consider these facts:

• The incidence of overweight children in the United States, ages 4-12, has gone up dramatically in the past 12 years-by 50 percent among white children, 120 percent among Latino children, and 175 percent among African-American children. Prior studies show that it took 30 years for the prevalence of overweight in children to double. Thus, if projected over 30 years, the incidence of overweight would show a 125 percent increase in white children, a 300 percent increase in Latino children, and a 438 percent increase in African-American children. For California, this is especially sobering, given that during the 1990's, 47.5 percent of all births in the state were to Latina women.

• In the past 20 years, the incidence of overweight and obesity has doubled among children and tripled among adolescents.

• In California, nearly one in three adolescents is considered at risk of becoming or is already overweight. In addition, in 2001, 77 percent of California students in grades, 5, 7, and 9 failed to meet minimum standards in the state-mandated six-category fitness test. Further, 51 percent did not meet standards in at least five of the six categories.

• Being overweight and obese can lead to Type 2 diabetes, heart disease, and cancer of the colon, breast, uterus, and other cancers.

• Being overweight and obese is now second only to tobacco as the leading cause of death in America. Annually in the United States, 430,000 people die prematurely from tobacco-related illnesses, and 300,000 die prematurely from illnesses related to being overweight and obese.

In response to these disturbing statistics, the following health officials and institutions have declared:

• "The United States is now witnessing and obesity epidemic among young
children."
-Dr. William Dietz, Director of Nutrition and Physical Activity, Centers for Disease Control and Prevention

•"We've got the fattest, least fit
generation of kids ever."
-Dr. James O. Hill, Nutritionist, University of Colorado

•"Overweight is the most common health
problem facing U.S. children."
-Journal of the American Medical Association (12/12/01)

•"We now believe physical activity is a
primary component of preventing cancer."
-Abby Bloch, Chair, American Cancer Society Advisory Panel

•"This is perhaps the most sedentary generation of Americans in our history. . . . Left unabated, the problem of obesity will soon be responsible for more preventable deaths and diseases than tobacco is
today."
-Dr. David Satcher, Outgoing U.S. Surgeon General

•"If these dangerous trends continue at the current rates, the impact on our nation's health and medical care costs in future
years will be overwhelming."
-Dr. Jeffrey Koplan, Director, Centers for Disease Control and Prevention

School officials are under a great deal of pressure regarding state-mandated tests and requirements. They want students to be excited about their academic courses and they want their students to be healthy and fit. However, with the reality of state test scores being printed in the newspapers and the threats that accompany low scores, these officials have focused almost exclusively on meeting the test requirements rather than the single-most important test criterion of all-the comprehensive wellness of each and every schoolchild.

In our headlong quest to improve standardized test scores, we're losing the hearts of our schoolchildren. Not only are most middle and high school students apathetic about their academic courses, but the very nonengaging, nonwellness-oriented way of being in our schools is compromising their health. The current method of schooling is creating a situation where the students are figuratively and literally dying to learn.

Although he was only referring to the physical health of children, former Surgeon General Satcher's following statement puts all of this in its proper perspective: "The schools are critical points of intervention. (They) have a responsibility to our children that we're not living up to."

Note: On Wednesday, May 8, at 7:30 p.m., the American Sports Institute (116 E. Blithedale Ave., Mill Valley) is hosting a 90-minute meeting to explore the issues presented in this article and to present possible solutions. The meeting is open to the public. Admission is free. For more information, call 415-383-5750.

Joel Kirsch, Ph.D., is president of the American Sports Institute.