On a Monday morning in early November, fitness fanatics, connected to computers featuring personalized workout data, pedal on stationary bikes. Nearby, several people scale a rock-climbing wall. All wear heart monitors on their wrists and gold-and-black T shirts bearing the logo of their facility, the Madison Health Club. As one biker gets caught up in watching the presidential candidates duke it out on TV, her heart-rate monitor starts beeping. "Oops," she says, embarrassed to draw the attention of her teacher. "That means I'm out of my target zone."
Most fitness centers, of course, don't require members to wear heart-rate monitors to gauge how well they're staying "in the zone," but these exercisers are only 13 years old and are taking part in their daily physical-education class at Madison Junior High in Naperville, Ill. The Health Club, adjacent to the gymnasium, is the center of the school's PE program.
To baby boomers, many of whom are haunted by memories of militaristic coaches or being picked last for kickball, a relaxed PE class is an oxymoron. Their children, though, are beginning to benefit from a "New PE" movement that is taking hold in hundreds of school districts across the country. Naperville, which has been cited by the Centers for Disease Control, is a national model. Unlike the old, often dreaded gym class, with its focus on team sports, New PE stresses lifetime fitness. "The old model attended to skills many kids won't be using as adults--and it has left many on the sidelines," says Phil Lawler, founder of the Naperville program. "We're enabling each kid to maintain a fit lifestyle forever. It's really preventive health care."
That idea has struck a chord with some high-profile advocates. Last year Jim Baugh, CEO of Wilson Sporting Goods, raised $1 million from fellow manufacturers and spearheaded PE4Life, a national organization dedicated to promoting PE. A bill sponsored by Alaska Senator Ted Stevens that would provide $400 billion in funding for innovative PE programs is currently awaiting passage in Congress. And last summer President Clinton called on the departments of Education and Health and Human Services to produce a report on ways to address youth inactivity. The document--the first of its kind--is due to be released before the end of the year.
Why the escalating attention? For starters, PE class has become practically invisible over the past decade--even as American kids have become alarmingly obese. In 1991, 42% of high school kids participated in daily PE. Now only 25% do. Less than a quarter of all children get 20 minutes of vigorous exercise a day; 25% of all students don't get any PE. Only seven states require elementary PE teachers to be certified; three don't require PE at all. Georgia, the state with the highest rate of increase in obesity in the past 10 years, voted last summer to give middle schools the option of reducing PE. Only Illinois requires daily PE for grades K through 12--and even there, schools are getting around the requirement with waivers that allow students to substitute activities like school band for PE.