Posted on 09/09/2005 7:14:49 AM PDT by ExitPurgamentum
1 hour, 34 minutes ago
An Australian high school hopes to stop beach-loving students from bailing out of class by making surfing an approved subject.
Byron Bay High School will offer surfing as part of a recreation course that from next year will count toward a high school certificate in New South Wales state.
"You've got students who are at risk of dropping out of school and the school has developed this course as a way to provide a pathway for these students into future employment and keep them connected to education," state Education Minister Carmel Tebbutt said.
But Federal Education Minister Brendan Nelson said surfing as a subject made a mockery of the education system.
"That we're now apparently offering it as a HSC (high school certificate) subject in New South Wales is an absolute disgrace," Nelson said.
Byron Bay has 16 surfing students this year but the state school board has only agreed to allow the subject to count toward a student's HSC from next year.
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If you can't educate them --- join them.
If they can have phys-ed classes forcing students to run around pointlessly on a basketball court with inflated pink rubber balls, then why not a surfing class?
If the schools have a phys ed requirement for graduation, why not allow students to fulfill that requirement this way?
Sounds good to me.
I'm stoked dude!
dude!
I went to school very close to DHHS and we had SCUBA Classes in the school swimming pool and bowling at the local bowling alley for physical education.
After bowling for a semester, I actually got pretty good. I still have a good game after all of these years.
The funny thing is that the coach was the HS football coach (Johnson for those of you that followed his children in So. Cal college football). You know he hated hanging out at the bowling alley for an hour and half with a bunch of non atheletes. Part of the fun taking bowling was watching this guys misery.
My high school had a surf team (Spruce Creek, Port Orange, FL) and we surfed competitively against other schools. I was a member of the team, and can attest that we were, on average, healthier than most of the slugs in gym class. We also got tubed more often :)
Phy Ed is totally rad dude.....
Your comment reflects inland stupidity - would you ban football players from attending practice, too?
That may be. An alternative explanation is that "inland" knows the culture associated with surfing. You cannot deny also that beech atmosphere is very different from any other gym class ON school grounds, would you?
Some students do study Physical Education at these levels, and that does include an active component but it's still very intense academically as well (studying physiology, history of sport, etc). If this new surfing course is going to be as academic as other PE courses, I don't think there is any problem with it - what concerns me though - and concerns a lot of people - is that a course which has been specifically designed to try and keep kids in school is rather likely to have been watered down academically as part of that effort.
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