Overview Fact Sheet Bad News Good News

Beginning May 10, for eight hours a day over a 10-12 day period, Joel Kirsch, president of the Marin-based, nonprofit American Sports Institute, will do a pilgrimage that will begin the morning of Day 1 at Marin County’s northern border with Sonoma and end on the final day at Marin’s southern border with San Francisco on the Golden Gate Bridge. Joel will travel the entire distance in the following manner: 1) stand straight; 2) without moving the feet, crouch down and extend the body fully in a push-up position; 3) do a push-up; 4) bring the feet forward one at a time to where the hands are; 5) stand straight once again; and 6) repeat the entire process continuously. Whether or not you wish to do any push-ups, you’re invited to help transform America’s public schools by joining Joel in the Pilgrimage for any amount of time you wish—a few moments, several minutes, an hour, or more—and you’ll have your picture taken while you’re participating!!!

Why is Joel doing the Pilgrimage? To raise awareness and funds for the creation of The Arete School of Sport Culture and Wellness that will be based in Marin County. With the vast majority of America’s students dulled-down, disengaged, and bored in their academic classes; with so many students dropping out of school, especially those from disadvantaged families; and with the crisis in childhood overweight and obesity, The Arete School will be a tuition-free, privately-funded model for solving these problems and transforming America’s troubled public-school system. (Scroll down for a summary of these problems and solutions. For more detailed data, click on the Bad News and Good News links on the right side of this page.)

While it is not required, participants who join Joel in the Pilgrimage are encouraged to make a tax-deductible donation to support of development of The Arete School. Checks are to be made out to: The Arete School. Whether or not you make a donation, the most important thing is that you participate!!!

If you would like to support the development of The Arete School without participating in the Pilgrimage, you can mail a check or credit card information to the American Sports Institute, or you can make a secure, online, credit card donation. It’s easy to do—just click here, then select your method of payment and fill out the online form.

For more information about The Arete School Pilgrimage, including how to participate, click here, call the American Sports Institute at 415-383-5750, or email us.

Learning, Our Schools, and Our Kids

The Bad News

• The dropout rate in America’s public high schools is 30%. For Latinos and African Americans, its 45%-50%. The dropout rate in America’s 50 largest cities is 48%.
• While America’s high-school dropout rate is 30%, two-thirds of all secondary-school students read below their grade level. This means that annually, whether because of dropping out or low levels of knowledge and skills, two-thirds of all high-school students who leave school are not only ill-prepared for college or work, they can’t read well enough to catch up.
• Nationally, 75% of all high school students are “chronically disengaged” in their academic courses, high achievers and underperformers alike.
• When comparing levels of engagement by location and activity, students are least engaged in their academic classes and when doing school work.
• One in five or 20% of American four-year-olds is not just overweight but obese, and one-third of all American children and adolescents are either overweight or obese.
• When it comes to actually providing PE on a daily basis for all students for the entire school year, only 3.8% of elementary schools, 7.9% of middle schools, and 2.1% of high schools do so.
  

• According to the California Department of Education, students who are physically fit and engage in regular, physical activity perform better academically than unfit students.
• When comparing levels of engagement by location and activity, students are least engaged in their academic classes and when doing school work, and most engaged in their non-academic classes and active-leisure activities, including sports.
• Students who are physically fit and engage in regular, physical activity perform better academically than unfit students.
• For 23 years, the now-retired Pete Saccone and his fifth-grade students went for a 45 to 50-minute run on the school grounds every morning at 8:00 a.m. to start their day at Meridian Elementary School in El Cajon, California, just east of San Diego. After each run, the students would go into the classroom to do math and writing assignments related to their running. According to the Meridian principal, Saccone’s class always had the highest test scores in the school.
• Since 1989, the American Sports Institute has implemented its educational-change program Promoting Achievement in School through Sport (PASS), a year-long course for middle and high-school students that uses the positive aspects of sport culture to generate high academic achievement, high health and fitness levels, and high motivation scores. PASS has been presented to approximately 5,000 students in four states, including California, Illinois, North Carolina, and South Carolina. In a government study of the PASS program, researchers concluded: “PASS addresses the needs of the whole learner—intellectual needs, motivational needs, and other needs such as students’ physical and social needs. . . . PASS is a model for total school reform.”
• Using elements of its PASS program, the American Sports Institute helped Coulterville-Greeley, a small, K-8 school near Yosemite, raise its state test scores 200 points over six years and become a California Distinguished School. One of the key findings from the state evaluation committee was the school’s “commitment to aerobics every morning (their underline) and the PASS program woven throughout their daily school lives.”