- D.C. officials seek stronger oversight of charter schools after recent fraud allegations [FOCUS, Options PCS, Community Academy PCS, Friendship PCS, Imagine Southeast PCS, Imagine Hope PCS, Somerset Prep PCS, BASIS DC PCS, Democracy Prep PCS, Harmony PCS, and St. Coletta PCS mentioned]
- Legislation to oversee charter school CMOs not the way to go [Community Academy PCS and Options PCS mentioned]
- D.C. school boundary proposal draws mixed reactions
- What the Proposed Boundary Changes Mean for Each of the City’s High Schools
- U.S. schools develop a nicer version of gym class
D.C. officials seek stronger oversight of charter schools after recent fraud allegations [FOCUS, Options PCS, Community Academy PCS, Friendship PCS, Imagine Southeast PCS, Imagine Hope PCS, Somerset Prep PCS, BASIS DC PCS, Democracy Prep PCS, Harmony PCS, and St. Coletta PCS mentioned]
The Washington Post
By Emma Brown
June 15, 2014
Recent fraud allegations against leaders at two D.C. public charter schools have illuminated what city officials are calling a gap in their ability to effectively oversee the financial dealings of the fast-growing charter school sector.
Following two cases in which the D.C. attorney general has accused charter school leaders of schemes to divert millions of tax dollars to private companies they owned, the D.C. Public Charter School Board is seeking legislative changes that would give it greater authority to examine the records of some of the organizations that manage the city’s charter schools.
The charter board also is looking to tighten standards that charter schools must meet to sign contracts with “related parties,” such as school founders, school employees, members of the board of directors and their relatives.
While the move indicates that the charter board wants more transparency, it also shows that city officials often don’t know how management companies are spending tax money that is meant for students’ benefit.
Any new authority probably will be narrow: The charter board’s draft legislation, developed months ago, would allow it to examine the records of only a small number of companies. The notion of broad new oversight power probably would spark protest from some in the charter school movement, which is built on the premise that schools should operate free of outside interference as long as they produce solid academic results.
Scott Pearson, the charter board’s executive director, said he doesn’t want new rules to be so onerous or invasive that they deter good charter operators. But “they’re using taxpayer dollars, and there should be a standard” for how those dollars are used, Pearson said.
The D.C. attorney general in October sued three former managers of Options Public Charter School for allegedly funneling more than $3 million from the school to two for-profit companies they owned. In May, the attorney general sued the founder of another charter school, Community Academy, alleging that he enriched himself by creating a shell management company that was paid more than $13 million in taxpayer dollars for work largely performed by school employees.
The charter board had given a clean bill of financial health to both schools in June 2013, finding “no patterns of fiscal mismanagement” at either, according to a charter board report.
Defense lawyers in both cases have argued that the charter schools’ business deals were legal and no different than contracts that more than a dozen D.C. charter schools have with outside management companies to operate the schools in exchange for a fee.
Several charter school management companies declined to comment on the board’s effort to seek additional oversight authority because legislation has not yet been introduced. Ramona Edelin, executive director of the D.C. Association of Chartered Public Schools, also declined to comment, saying that her members haven’t yet discussed the issue.
Donald Hense, executive director of the Friendship charter schools, one of the largest networks in the city, criticized the D.C. attorney general’s most recent lawsuit as unfair and said the charter board’s desire for more authority is part of a pattern of overreach. And Kara Kerwin, president of the pro-charter Center for Education Reform, said she worries that giving the charter board more power “is a slippery slope.”
“Allowing the legal process to take care of malfeasance is the proper way to go, as opposed to the charter board imposing more regulation,” Kerwin said.
City taxpayers send more than $600 million to charter schools, and in return, charters — which are required by law to be nonprofit organizations — submit independent financial audits, annual budgets, large contracts and other financial data to the city charter board.
The charter schools that have contracts with outside management organizations send fees that range from 2 to 100 percent of their operating budgets.
The management agreements are something of a financial black hole, according to charter school board officials, who say they have limited ability to monitor how the tax dollars are used. When the management organizations are private for-profit companies, they are not subject to the same financial disclosure rules as nonprofits.
There are at least four for-
profit charter management companies operating in the District now: Imagine Schools Inc., a Virginia company that runs Imagine Southeast and Imagine Hope Community schools for a fee of 12 percent of each school’s revenue; Academica, a Florida company that runs Somerset Prep Academy for a 5 percent fee; Community Action Partners, which collects a 6 percent fee to run the Dorothy I. Height Community Academy Public Charter School; and Basis Educational Group, an Arizona company that runs Basis DC for a 20 percent fee.
Phil Handler, a spokesman for Basis Educational Group, said the company’s fee is relatively high because the company covers the salaries of the school’s top officials.
Most of the management companies operating in the District are nonprofits, and two charter schools slated to open in D.C. next fall — Democracy Prep and Harmony — also are run by out-of-state nonprofits.
Nonprofits must disclose some financial information with the Internal Revenue Service annually via Form 990, including the salaries of any employees who make more than $100,000. But charter board officials said that the publicly available information is not necessarily sufficient for strong oversight.
St. Coletta Special Education Public Charter School transfers its entire $16 million budget to its management organization. As a result, the charter school’s public budget is stark, showing that the school spends zero dollars on personnel, office expenses and student services.
The management organization, St. Coletta of Greater Washington, operates two schools under the same roof, a D.C. public charter and a private school that accepts tuition-paying students from Maryland and Virginia. Pearson said that while the board has no reason to suspect wrongdoing at St. Coletta, it’s difficult to know for sure that D.C. tax dollars are being used only to serve D.C. public school students.
St. Coletta executive director Sharon Raimo said the charter school and the parent organization already go through multiple layers of financial review by independent auditors and the IRS, state education agencies, Medicaid oversight agencies and the D.C. Public Charter School Board.
“I don’t know what else we could possibly give them that they don’t already have,” Raimo said, adding that she wasn’t afraid of additional oversight but that it would take more of her staff’s time.
Last fall, the charter board proposed legislation that would give it access to the books and records of only a subset of management organizations: those that received more than half their income from D.C. charter schools or received more than 20 percent of any one school’s budget.
Such expansion of oversight probably would affect only a few existing management organizations. Robert Cane, executive director of the pro-charter group Focus, said he could support such narrow expansion, but it would not be appropriate to demand financial records from management companies that run schools across the country and receive only a small fraction of their income from D.C. charters.
The charter board’s existing draft legislation would require schools entering contracts with related parties to ensure that those deals are fair and that conflicts of interest are fully disclosed to the school’s board of directors. Currently, schools have to meet one of those two conditions to comply with the law. The charter board is working to refine the proposed legislation.
D.C. Council Education Committee Chairman David A. Catania (I-At Large) said last fall that he was willing to work with the board to pass legislation and a spokesman for Mayor Vincent C. Gray (D) said Gray is also supportive.
There has been no public movement on the issue, but the May lawsuit against Kent Amos, the founder of Community Academy, appears to have kick-started discussions again. “My sense is we’re both committed to resolving this, so I would be surprised if we don’t have some legislation by the end of the council term,” Pearson said.
Legislation to oversee charter school CMOs not the way to go [Community Academy PCS and Options PCS mentioned]
The Examiner
By Mark Lerner
June 16, 2014
Earlier this month it was revealed that D.C. Attorney General Irvin Nathan is suing Kent Amos, the founder of Community Academy Public Charter School, for diverting over 13 million dollars from the charter to Mr. Amos' for-profit charter management organization Community Actions Partners and Charter School Management LLC. The highlight of the legal complaint by Mr. Nathan is the allegation that the CMO in 2010 entered into a loan agreement to purchase a new LEXUS 460 sports utility vehicle. The car, registered in Mr. Amos' name, came with a monthly payment of $1,148. It had the specialty license plate KIDS.
Today, the Washington Post's Emma Brown reveals that the action by the Attorney General and the controversy regarding public money involving Options PCS has led the executive director of the D.C. Public Charter School Board Scott Pearson to begin working with the D.C. Council on legislation allowing the PCSB some limited oversight over the contracts both for-profit and non-profit CMO's enter into with charter schools. Ms. Brown points out that the board will also look at the manner in which schools strike agreements with “related parties,” which she describes as "school founders, school employees, members of the board of directors and their relatives." All of this is to be expected. However, I believe it is a dangerous path.
First, let me say that as someone who has been a board chair for a couple of charters in this town, I stayed away from entering into contracts with related parties. Although this is permitted by following particular guidelines, I just found the opportunity for conflicts of interest to arise too great to take the chance. Second, I do not conceptually understand how the Board can be given some authority to review CMO contracts that would not be dictating to these independent schools how they should be run. In theory this may be a good idea so that the PCSB can provide some direction over how public money is spent, but in reality I believe that this power would turn Mr. Pearson into the board of directors of 50 schools. Also, seeking a legislative remedy may open the flood gates for the Council passing other bills exerting control over charters.
There is a better way. We need to go back to the original concept of including a school's financial health into the Performance Management Framework. A section could be included grading best practices regarding the design of CMO agreements. When a school fails to meet certain criteria their score would be reduced. Unusual contractual terms, or those for which information is not available, would be referred for possible legal action.
The public schools have improved significantly over the last decade due to freedoms granted to the local charter school movement. Moving toward increased regulation of this sector can stop the progress our students so greatly deserve.
D.C. school boundary proposal draws mixed reactions
The Washington Post
By Emma Brown
June 13, 2014
The District’s newest plan to overhaul public school boundariesprompted a broad range of reactions this week, as parents and activists began examining the proposed changes and what they would mean for the city.
Many people applauded the move to commit to neighborhood schools and abandon proposals for more radical changes that would have left school enrollment up to chance in some form of lottery.
Some embraced the proposal to do away with most K-8 schools in favor of reintroducing more stand-alone middle schools, calling it important for building a strong system that can compete with charter schools. Others were glad to see recommendations to reopen several elementary schools that were closed just a year ago for low enrollment.
“Praise the Lord!” said Shannon Smith, who is the lead plaintiff in a lawsuit over those school closures and whose grandchildren attended Ferebee-Hope in Southeast Washington, one of the shuttered schools that could reopen. “I’m happy to hear that.”
But as with boundary changes almost anywhere, the redrawn maps yielded some clear winners and losers, ensuring that debate will continue in coming months. For many residents, the new proposal does not answer the most pressing question facing D.C. schools: What will it take to ensure that they improve faster and more consistently in every community so that children have access to a great school no matter where they live?
“It ignores the elephant in the room,” said Jeanne Contardo, a Ward 7 parent. “As long as you have unequal distribution of educational opportunity across the District, any attempt to redraw boundaries . . . is going to cause chaos.”
Contardo praised Abigail Smith, deputy mayor for education, for her efforts to solicit and respond to community feedback, saying the boundary recommendations seem sensible.
“I like what they were trying to do, but I don’t really see it being implemented,” she said, given the lame-duck status of Mayor Vincent C. Gray (D) and likely pushback from communities facing the prospect of losing access to schools they now have a right to attend.
Gray is slated to announce final boundaries in September, but it will be up to his successor to implement the changes. Among those vying for the mayor’s job, none said they would adopt the initial three proposals, first floated in April.
Democratic nominee Muriel Bowser and independent David A. Catania said Friday that they need more time to review the proposal before saying which specific parts they will or will not support.
Catania said the new version is an “improvement over the three plans we received earlier this spring, which were non-starters,” but said he still has significant concerns about certain elements. “For me, the real issue is, where is the plan to improve all matter-of-right neighborhood schools? That should be our primary focus, and it isn’t,” he said.
Communities east of the Anacostia River — traditionally a dividing line between wealthy and poor — would lose their right to cross the river to attend Eastern High on Capitol Hill. Among neighborhood e-mail groups Friday, that proposal immediately drew fire as being unfair.
Another community likely to push back is Crestwood, an affluent area east of Rock Creek Park and one of several parts of the city that would lose their access to two sought-after Northwest schools, Alice Deal Middle and Wilson High.
“We’re not happy at all,” said parent Carolyn Reynold, who said she bought a home in the neighborhood in part because of its access to Deal and Wilson. “We’re very disappointed and upset at the prospect of being told that we need to send our kids to lower-performing schools.”
Children in her neighborhood would be sent to MacFarland Middle, a closed Northwest school that would reopen with a focus on dual-language instruction, and Roosevelt High, a school that has struggled to attract families but is slated to be renovated and turned into an international-focused school.
“It’s hard to trust them that it will be good enough when it’s time for us to go there,” said Jeff Steele, another Crestwood parent, adding that there’s no money in the capital budget to pay for a major renovation of MacFarland or either of the other two new neighborhood middle schools called for in the proposal.
Pedro Rubio, an education advocate and former D.C. Council candidate who lives a few miles northeast of Crestwood, sees things differently. He is part of a group that’s been campaigning for the new middle schools as an essential part of rebuilding a strong neighborhood school system. “It’s a big win,” Rubio said.
Parts of Ward 2 also would be rezoned to send children to a new middle school that would open at the old Shaw Middle and to Cardozo High, which has one of the lowest graduation rates in the city. Cardozo’s boundaries would shift entirely into the city’s Northwest quadrant.
Stephanie Maltz, an education activist and Advisory Neighborhood Commission member from Ward 2, said she’s eager for more details about plans to ensure that both schools are high-quality and attractive to families.
“I don’t really know what this middle school is going to look like and how it’s going to be successful,” she said.
What the Proposed Boundary Changes Mean for Each of the City’s High Schools
Washington City Paper
By Aaron Wiener and Julia Tanaka
June 13, 2014
The city is out with its revised proposal for overhauling the school assignment policies and boundaries. Some parents—those in boundary for Wilson High School, for instance—are likely relieved to have been spared the more radical propositions suggested in an earlier round of proposals. Others will still be concerned about the changes, which shift some students to different, and sometimes lower-performing, schools.
Let's drill down the changes on the high school level, looking at each of the city's nine neighborhood public high schools.
Anacostia High School
Current enrollment: 751
Number of grade-appropriate public school students living within the current boundary (SY 13-14): 2,475
Number of grade-appropriate public school students living within the proposed boundary (SY 13-14): 3,575
Boundary participation (% public school students living in boundary and attending) (SY 13-14): 20 percent
Anacostia doesn't experience a major change, instead getting a small expansion to its borders. It would absorb Barry Farm, which to Anacostia parents might be a mixed bag: The neighborhood currently consists of a troubled public-housing complex, but is slated for renovation into a mixed-income community. It would also see its northern boundary stretch all the way to East Capitol Street. These changes mean nearly 1,000 additional in-boundary students. The question, at a school that only 20 percent of in-boundary students currently attend, is how many of those students would actually come to Anacostia.
Ballou High School
Current enrollment: 678
Number of grade-appropriate public school students living within the current boundary (SY 13-14): 2,475
Number of grade-appropriate public school students living within the proposed boundary (SY 13-14): 2,551
Boundary participation (% public school students living in boundary and attending) (SY 13-14): 21 percent
Ballou experiences the smallest boundary shift of any of the neighborhood high schools. The tinkering around the edges would boost the school's potential enrollment pool by fewer than 100 students.
Cardozo High School
Current enrollment: 681
Number of grade-appropriate public school students living within the current boundary (SY 13-14): 1,810
Number of grade-appropriate public school students living within the proposed boundary (SY 13-14): 1,284
Boundary participation (% public school students living in boundary and attending) (SY 13-14): 16 percent
Cardozo would undergo one of the biggest shifts of any school, losing about half its current territory—northern Columbia Heights, southern Petworth, northern Bloomingdale, and parts of Edgewood and Brookland—and gaining a large swath of Adams Morgan, Dupont Circle, downtown, Shaw, Foggy Bottom, and the West End. That's actually a substantial cut in the number of in-boundary potential students. But with wealthier areas being incorporated, it could mean a rise in the school's fortunes, and possibly a higher in-boundary enrollment rate than the current 16 percen—if those parents don't balk and send their kids to charters or elsewhere.
Coolidge High School
Current enrollment: 433
Number of grade-appropriate public school students living within the current boundary (SY 13-14): 1,070
Number of grade-appropriate public school students living within the proposed boundary (SY 13-14): 1,143
Boundary participation (% public school students living in boundary and attending) (SY 13-14): 18 percent
Coolidge might appear to lose its wealthiest areas, around Shepherd Park, but that's really just an illusion: Even if these neighborhoods were technically in the Coolidge boundary, they were eligible to go to Deal Middle School and then feed into Wilson High School. Now they officially move to Wilson. Otherwise, the Coolidge boundary remains largely the same.
Dunbar High School
Current enrollment: 628
Number of grade-appropriate public school students living within the current boundary (SY 13-14): 1,390
Number of grade-appropriate public school students living within the proposed boundary (SY 13-14): 2,169
Boundary participation (% public school students living in boundary and attending) (SY 13-14): 20 percent`
Dunbar, like Cardozo, sees a radical shift in its boundaries here. Currently near the center of its attendance zone, Dunbar would move to the far west side as it absorbs territory to the north and east. Gone are the area around Mount Vernon Square and portions of Capitol Hill; added are the NoMa neighborhood and a wide swath of the Brookland, Edgewood, and Fort Lincoln area. Dunbar essentially ceases to be a center-city school and becomes the school for most of Ward 5. In the process, it gains nearly 800 in-boundary potential students.
Eastern High School
Current enrollment: 783
Number of grade-appropriate public school students living within the current boundary (SY 13-14): 1,738
Number of grade-appropriate public school students living within the proposed boundary (SY 13-14): 1,606
Boundary participation (% public school students living in boundary and attending) (SY 13-14): 17 percent
Like Dunbar, Eastern essentially becomes a ward school, only for Ward 6. It loses all its territory east of the Anacostia River, deepening the divide between the two sides of the river that has historically marked the border between poor and rich (or at least less poor). For Capitol Hill parents, this could be a major opportunity to turn Eastern into a more popular option for the middle-class community; for residents of the current eastern reaches of the school's boundary, it means missing out on that possibility.
HD Woodson High School
Current enrollment: 762
Number of grade-appropriate public school students living within the current boundary (SY 13-14): 835
Number of grade-appropriate public school students living within the proposed boundary (SY 13-14): 1,789
Boundary participation (% public school students living in boundary and attending) (SY 13-14): 35 recent
Woodson becomes the school for the entire Northeast section of the area east of the Anacostia River. In the process, it more than doubles the number of potential students within its boundary.
Roosevelt High School
Current enrollment: 438
Number of grade-appropriate public school students living within the current boundary (SY 13-14): 1,998
Number of grade-appropriate public school students living within the proposed boundary (SY 13-14): 1,974
Boundary participation (% public school students living in boundary and attending) (SY 13-14): 14 percent
Roosevelt, currently at the western edge of its boundary territory, moves to the center as it becomes the school for Petworth, Crestwood, Park View, and parts of Columbia Heights. Crestwood parents won't be happy about losing the right to attend Wilson, but it's Roosevelt's gain. With new borders around a rapidly gentrifying neighborhood, long-suffering Roosevelt could finally start to see a wealthier student body, which often correlates to greater success. But that's only if the students in its boundary start attending Roosevelt at higher than the current dismal 14 percent rate.
Wilson High School
Current enrollment: 1,696
Number of grade-appropriate public school students living within the current boundary (SY 13-14): 1,567
Number of grade-appropriate public school students living within the proposed boundary (SY 13-14): 1,114
Boundary participation (% public school students living in boundary and attending) (SY 13-14):56 percent
Wilson is wildly overcrowded, because it's in such high demand. A major driver of the boundary changes is the need to depopulate Wilson a bit. The school loses Crestwood, areas around Dupont Circle and Foggy Bottom, and the Southwest quadrant. Technically, it gains Shepherd Park, but people there were already attending Wilson anyway through the feeder system. The number of potential students within the boundary drops by more than 500—which likely means around 500 angry parents who will try to do something about this before it's finalized.
Maps via the Office of the Deputy Mayor for Education
U.S. schools develop a nicer version of gym class
The Washington Post
By Michael Alison Chandler
June 14, 2014
The cavernous gymnasium at Patriot High School can be intimidating for 15-year-old Kristin Ansah. When students break out the hockey sticks before gym class, she ducks for cover.
“I don’t work out,” she said. “I don’t play sports.”
But Kristin looks forward to her physical education classes, because her teachers let her choose what she wants to play. During the first unit, she bypassed football and tennis for jump-rope games with her friends. “It reminded me of my childhood,” she said.
The program at the Prince William County school is part of a national effort to mobilize a generation that has been labeled the most sedentary in the nation’s history. It represents a major shift in physical education to reverse the trend of inertia, with gym teachers working harder to make sure that their classes don’t appeal just to the most athletic students while the rest of the kids in school-issued shorts are left sitting on the sidelines.
“The country depends on us to do something different than what we have been doing,” said Dolly Lambdin, president of the Society of Health and Physical Educators (SHAPE). “We cared too much about who is the best, who can do the most push-ups, and not nearly enough about what it means to be healthy and physically active for a lifetime.”
“The New PE,” as it’s often called, is a nicer PE.
Out are dodgeball and other sports that use kids as targets, contests that reward students who are the strongest, and exercise doled out (or withheld) as a form of punishment: Still talking? Four more laps!
In are personal fitness plans, target heart-rate zones, and sports that play to different strengths and introduce students to activities that they can pursue across a lifetime. “Physically literate” and “lifelong movers” are buzzwords of the New PE.
Nearly one of every three U.S. children is overweight or obese, a rate that has tripled in the past three decades. Students are less likely to walk to school or play outside before dinner, and they are more likely to spend hours in front of a television or computer screen. Many advocates see physical education, with its potential to reach 56 million students, as a key way to influence behavior during and after the school day.
The D.C. public school system received a federal grant to introduce students to more “life-time physical activities,” said Heather Holaday, the health and physical education program manager for the District.
Archery is one of many sports, including rock climbing, fly fishing and yoga, that District schools are now offering as they try to up the activity level of a wider range of students. Archery — popularized in the “Hunger Games” movies — has egalitarian appeal, Holaday said.
“You could be standing next to the most athletic person in your class and have a chance to be successful,” she said.
Some of Miesha Thompson’s physical education students at Roosevelt Senior High School were skeptical as they went through an 11-step introduction to archery one day this spring.
“Bows and arrows?” asked freshman Karlos Kinney, eyebrows raised. Thirty minutes later, any grumbling was drowned out by the sound of whap! whap!, followed by cheers and “I got it in the red!”
The school district is also investing in technology, including heart monitors, that teach students how their bodies respond to exercise and give them a picture of how hard they are working. The monitors also help teachers evaluate students based on effort rather than on how fast they are moving.
School districts across the country are adopting different approaches to introducing lasting exercise habits to more students.
In Prince George’s County, high school students take “Your Personal Fitness,” a required class during which they create individual plans with activities they can pursue outside of school, such as Zumba or walking around the neighborhood.
And a Fairfax County program is outfitting students with pedometers so they can analyze how much exercise they are getting during their daily lives.
Professional associations for physical educators have spent 20 years trying to make the curriculum more accessible through academic standards and teacher training.
First lady Michelle Obama gave the effort a big boost in recent years with her campaign to get kids moving. Last year, she launched a schools-based program to increase physical activity throughout the school day with a goal of 60 minutes of exercise per day, the amount recommended by the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services. An Institute of Medicine report estimates that at least half of students fall short of that amount. Walking or biking to school, recess, intramural sports, classroom breaks and physical education are all part of the push.
Competing for attention
The efforts come as physical education programs struggle for time and resources, overshadowed by growing academic demands. In a 2007 survey of school administrators, 44 percent reported cutting time from physical education and recess, as well as other subjects, to increase reading and math instruction following the passage of the No Child Left Behind law.
Advocates point to growing evidence that shows a connection between exercise and academic performance. But most state and local regulations are weak when it comes to what federal law considers a nonessential subject.
Just six states require elementary schools to provide at least 150 minutes of physical education a week, as recommended by the physical educators’ association. Just two states require middle or high schools to offer the recommended 225 minutes weekly, according to a state survey by researchers at the Bridging the Gap Program at the University of Illinois at Chicago. The 2010 Healthy Schools Act in the District requires elementary and middle schools to meet these standards by next school year. Virginia and Maryland laws have no time limits.
Time spent in physical education tends to drop off in high school. Most states, including Virginia and the District, require only one or two years of physical education in high school to graduate. Maryland requires one semester.
At the same time, the era of testing and accountability is helping to shape physical education. The New PE has an official test that yields reams of data used to evaluate programs, mold instruction and help students set fitness goals.
The Presidential Physical Fitness Test, a mainstay of gym classes for decades, was officially retired last school year, based on the recommendation of a childhood obesity task force convened by the president. The contest rewarded students and schools if they scored in the 85th percentile or higher in such categories as curl-ups, push-ups and the mile-long endurance run.
The new president-sponsored test, the Fitnessgram, evaluates students according to their personal progress and research-based targets of optimal healthy fitness levels for each age and gender. Many school districts in the Washington area years ago switched to the new test, which was originally designed in 1982. The categories are similar, though there is a trend away from the mile run.
With the mile, the kids who are the least fit are the last to finish, said Cheryl Richardson, senior director of member engagement and programming for SHAPE. The more popular test now is a goal-based, back-and-forth shuttle run across the gym, and the kids who are the most fit tend to run more times — and be the last to finish. “It changes the tone from a hurry-up-and-finish to a how-long-can-you-go?”
Some people are wary of the changes in physical education, worrying that the cultural shift could soften the nation’s children.
“It’s becoming too politically correct,” said Dennis Senibaldi, a school board member in Windham, N.H., who advocated against a policy in his district to ban dodgeball last year.
“We want to teach kids you don’t always get first place, you don’t always get a trophy. . . . My son didn’t make the seventh-grade soccer team. Should we get rid of the soccer program because not everyone made it?”
‘As many as you can’
Even though the new tests are geared to be less competitive, many students still dread them.
“Just exempt me now. I can’t do it,” Kristin Ansah told her teacher at Patriot High School in Bristow, Va., on the spring morning she had to take her push-up test. At the beginning of the year, she completed five push-ups before collapsing.
Kristin used to live in Staten Island, where she would walk to the store or the bus stop, but since moving to the Northern Virginia suburbs two years ago, gym class is often the only exercise she gets.
When her teacher, Charles Porterfield, showed no mercy, she reluctantly lined up with the other girls against the wall.
“Backs nice and flat. Down 90 degrees,” Porterfield prompted. “Think about the number you got last time and try a little harder this time.”
A recording turned on. “Ready? Begin,” the voice droned. “Down, up one. Down, up two. Down, up three.”
“Do as many as you can, literally till your arms are shaking and you can’t do any more,” Porterfield said.
Kristin made it past five, then six, then seven, before finally stopping at eight.
A regional soccer star in her class kept going long after everyone else had let out a last groan, surpassing 60 push-ups.
But Kristin was happy with her number.
“I improved,” she said.