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My instructor for all four years, Mr. Austin, a Korean War combat vet, ran us a couple miles and had us do 50 push ups every day.

You haven't been near a high school lately, have you? It's all teaching you how to do basic sports, showing you what the weightlifting equipment looks like. Unless you're lucky, there's not much emphasis on actually getting physically fit.

I've got to agree with your assessment of high school P.E. If my son weren't in sports, he wouldn't be in any shape at all from the regular curriculum. This is in a good quality private school, but I don't think the public schools are any better. In fact, they're probably worse, because they are so much bigger, and I expect there's a much smaller percentage of the student body involved in varsity athletics. We have around 400 students grades 9-12, and six spring sports (baseball, soccer, track, lacrosse, golf, tennis, both boy's and girl's for each), so there's plenty of room, lots of encouragement to be involved. In one of those humongous public AAAAA schools with 3000-4000 students, I can't imagine that's the case, even with J.V. teams.