Racine Unified high school students are no longer required to change for gym class, a change officials hope will see more kids in class instead of skipping.
District Executive Director of Curriculum and Instruction Chris Thompson told The Journal Times that students fail gym at a fairly high rate because of both the requirement that they change out of street clothes and the lack of variety in the curriculum.
“It’s a class where we do have a higher failure rate,” he said. “We have to look at it as the adults in charge and say how can we make a difference?”
In addition to offering badminton, basketball, and volleyball, schools will now also give students the opportunity to learn more about rugby and fitness, the story continues.
Gym teachers at William Horlick High School, for example, think that expanded programming is a great idea because kids who enjoy flag football could be a different group of students than those who would prefer archery, for example.
“Over the years we realized not every kid likes those generic sports or activities and slowly started to incorporate new things. The kids that take archery are not going to be the kids that take flag football. They’re just different and that’s OK,” Horlick gym teacher Lorenzo Venegas is quoted as saying.