Lufkin School Board to vote on health and PE requirements
July 12th, 2009
The Lufkin Daily News
The Lufkin School Board will vote in an open public meeting on whether or not to keep health and physical education as a local graduation requirement Thursday — a unanimous proposal by the district’s Student Health Association Committee.
This legislative session House Bill 3 passed, changing high school graduation requirements across the state. Under the new plan, those two courses have become electives, cancelling out the previous state required 1.5 credits of P.E. and a half credit of health for graduation eligibility.
“This is a perplexing part of the legislature considering that during the last session they spent a large amount of time and effort on student health and well being,” said Superintendent Roy Knight. “They passed laws about FITNESSGRAM (a test that monitors student fitness progress) and made changes regarding student nutrition in our lunch rooms going to all baked instead of fried foods. This year they undid all of that in one fell swoop.”
Knight attributes the changes to an eagerness for strengthening math and science skills at the cost of not educating students on the basic aspects of a healthy lifestyle. He also noted that with Texas having the highest teen pregnancy rate, skipping out on an introduction to the reproductive system and psychological response to relationships is not in the best interest of students. Last month the school board adopted a sex education program taught first as an abstinence-based program in the sixth grade (when students are first introduced to a health course) and later reinforced in high school during health class generally taken in the ninth grade.
“At the beginning of this legislative session there were several bills filed regarding sex education with Texas having the highest teen birth rate in the nation. In the same session they eliminate health as a core requirement? This is puzzling at best and foolish at worst,” Knight said. “I don’t know any 16 or 17 year old who thinks they need to know about health. I ask them if they think they need it and its ‘oh no, I watch HBO,’” he said.
Knight said he also wonders how doing away with health as a required course fits with the state requirement that every high school student be taught CPR in a classroom setting.
One thing Knight said he wants everyone in the community to know is that local state Rep. Jim McReynolds (D-Lufkin) and state Sen. Robert Nichols (R-Jacksonville) made great efforts to keep Angelina County superintendents informed on the changing stages of HB 3 and how it would impact students. As an “old-school teacher” McReynolds said he’s witnessed first hand the value of teaching health and physical fitness in the classroom.
“When you have a child that weighs 400 pounds in the fourth grade they’re pretty apt to trigger Type 2 Diabetes. The day you lose your health is the day you lose everything,” McReynolds said. “House Bill 3 began as an accountability bill to ensure that high school graduates are ready for college. I think that with 4.5 million kids in public education in this state if we miss them there, God help the state.”
Knight said he feels HB 3 passed because of a push from state Sen. Florence Shapiro (R-Plano). Shapiro comes from an affluent school district in the Dallas area — one that doesn’t see the poverty level evident in Angelina County, Knight said.
“(Shapiro) wants her name on an education bill for educational accountability because of her desire to run for (U.S.) Sen. (Kay Bailey) Hutchison’s (R-Texas) seat,” Knight said.
McReynolds said that while Shapiro has strong ideas about the education system what works in her district may not work in East Texas because of differing socioeconomic conditions.
“House Bill 3 has some things that don’t fit East Texas’ concept of things,” McReynolds said. “I will applaud next week if Lufkin’s board of trustees adopts those courses as a local graduation requirement.”
Lufkin’s school board will meet to vote on the matter Thursday at 6 p.m. in the administration building located at 101 Cotton Square.