Suck it Up or Quit
DD#1 came home crying yesterday. Again. It’s been a recurring thing since starting school.
Why?
PE
Yup, physical education.
She’s not very athletic, and after a summer of reading and little else, she’s not in shape. She knows it. But, because of the crazy way the classes rank students in the local public school system, her brain is not enough to keep her in the running to be in the top 10% of her class. She can be a straight A student. She can get the highest TAKS scores in her grade (which she did), but she’s not ranked high enough to be up in the top 10% because she’s not involved in athletics. What a sad, sad state of affairs (IMO) this ISD is in. Does a college application CARE that she’s involved in athletics, if they’re not recruiting her for such? NO.
Anyway, in order to try to get a higher ranking – because she DESERVES IT based on her grades and TAKS scores, she joined Tennis when she filled out her schedule last year. Whoa.
So, instead of regular PE, she had to take off-season PE. They started them, the first day (with no summer requests or requirements for getting in shape / getting ready for sports) by making them run – miles around the track. Weight lifting. Crunches and leg lifts. These are things she hasn’t done since last year, and in no way had she done them at the pace or speed that is now required. Ignorance on our part? Perhaps. But, to me, a teacher GUIDES a child – they start at the beginning and help them move toward a goal. That’s not what has been happening here. Their expectations started at a level she wasn’t at – and that just frustrated all parties.
On top of the ganglion cyst she has on her right wrist (which changes her weight-lifting routine), and babying the leg/foot that she broke her growth plate on two years ago … she sprained her other ankle last week.
She said her coach YELLED at her yesterday, telling her she was not taking pre-season seriously, that she was not giving it her all and that she was complaining too much. Granted, she admitted to doing all of these things. But, having a coach yell at her really hurt her feelings. The coach told her to get to the counselor today and change her schedule and get the heck out of off-season PE and get into regular PE.
I explained to her that the coach did that (right or wrong) to either make her mad enough to get in the game, or to quit.
She chose to quit.
Her dad went with her this morning and they got her schedule changed. I wasn’t there, I don’t know what happened. But, I do know that the current ranking at this school stinks and that I have one of the smartest children in the entire school. I also know that she’s enviously gifted in art and loves her drama class. And she’s relatively bored in all of the core classes such as world geography, introductory to physics and chemistry, english, etc.
Do we care that she’s not athletic? Absolutely not. Do we support her decision? Undeniably, we do. Do we have concerns? Of course – the main one being that the same PE teacher will have her in the new PE class – and will she be treated bad because she quit? We’ll wait and see.
I’m so sorry … school can be cruel. My GD#1 isn’t athletic either. So 2yrs ago she took PE in the summer for 8wk … hot and hard but she made it through. No more PE for her as our HS system only requires it once for 3yrs. She’s been in the band since 3rd grade and loves it. She’s a senior this year, her last in the Military Marching HS Band …. she’s looking forward to Band in College. Sometimes I wonder what School systems are thinking …. so many duh moments.
Every single trustee (aka school board) member either has kids who are in athletics or they were athletes themselves. Nothing is going to change here – we have to change our way of thinking about sports (which, honestly, isn’t going to happen). An EDUCATION is about LEARNING – not competing, not event dollars, not a new stadium. And my PhD husband has NO tolerance for those teachers who DO NOT TEACH! Unfortunately, I’m getting into that same frame of mind. BAH!
that’s awful!!!! I am not athletic either and never have been. PE was my worst subject, I didn’t know how to play the games. They figured cause I was tall, I’d be a great basketball player. ha! Were they sorry when they threw me the ball – I had NO idea what to do with it.
I’m sorry for your daughter, she shouldn’t have to go through this. Things like this can damage her spirit, ruining the enthusiasm she has for the other subjects. no child should be yelled at by a teacher unless they are committing a crime. grrrrr….
give her hugs for me.