SHAPE America’s 50 Million Strong is a Vision not a Prescription

There’s a memorable scene in the popular Sandra Bullock movie “Miss Congeniality” in which she’s asked, “What is the one most important thing our society needs?” The audience greets her first response with confused looks and silence so Bullock’s character quickly adds “and world peace.” The mood of the room instantly transforms. The crowd smiles and enthusiastically applauds. World peace was a vision that struck a very visceral emotional connection. What’s not to like about world peace? It’s something society obviously needs and for most of us well worth supporting.

Noticeably, the reaction of the listening audience wasn’t to pause and demand a definition of “world peace.” They had no problem understanding the intent. Similarly, who among us has any problems understanding what it means to be educated, hard working, ethical, trustworthy, competitive, dependable, organized and so on. We don’t need definitions. We get it. Sure, we each have slightly different perspectives on what exactly these words mean, but in general we GET IT!

Why then is the notion of getting kids physically active and healthy (which is what 50 MS represents) proving so hard for some people to understand and support? It’s no different from “world peace.” Yes, we can slice and dice the vision up in an effort to come to some sort of precise definition but to what purpose? Who needs it? Just as all of us likely support “world peace,” surely all PHE professionals can agree that “getting kids physically active and healthy” is a good thing to rally behind.

To those who believe this vision is best achieved through teaching to national standards – great! Go for it. To those who believe that advocating for “physical literacy” and “health literacy” will accelerate progress – fine, go ahead and use these terms. To those supporting LMAS or adopting a CSPAP approach, good for you! And to those who pay little attention to initiatives from outside groups or assessing standards, but pay a lot of attention to building relationships and preparing your students to be active and healthy inside and outside of school – more power to you!

It’s not the WHAT and HOW of 50 MS that’s so important but rather the WHY. The purpose behind what most of us seem to agree we should be aspiring to do. Whatever works for you is fine if it means that America’s youth are as a result choosing to become more physically active and are making healthier lifestyle choices. It‘s the result we need to be concerned about, the destination, rather than how different teachers are getting there.

Attempting to dictate to America’s 250,000 physical and health education teachers how best to educate 50 million uniquely different students would be a huge mistake. Over the past few months, several teachers have written about 50 MS: First in pelinks4u and more recently in PHE America. Unlike some of us, these teachers had no problems interpreting what 50 MS meant to them. And in some ways their views were all a bit different. There’s absolutely nothing wrong with this. Why should any of us believe that we have the capacity to dictate to others what 50 MS truly means? We don’t – we can’t – and we shouldn’t. In fact, the more any of us try to be prescriptive the more likely 50 MS will fail.

The notion that physical education should strive to get young people physically active and healthy was repeatedly expressed in the nearly 2000 essays submitted as part of NASPE’s PE 2020 initiative. 50 MS evolved from PE 2020 as a way to refocus the profession on what it needs to do to succeed in the future. 50 MS attempts to break the PE profession’s perennial pathologically desperate search for respect in America’s public schools. For years, we’ve foolishly convinced ourselves that through helping our classroom colleagues teach their content, everyone’s perceptions of the value of our unique subject matter would change. They haven’t. Instead, we’ve failed and continue to fail to do the very thing we most care about: To get young people more active and improve their health.

Physical and health educators have a vital role to play in what – if we did it right – could become a huge, transforming-for-the-profession, success story. Getting kids committed to living physically active and healthy lives takes a whole lot more than being physical activity organizers. Physical and health educators can deliver on this promise better than anyone else because success demands preparing young people with the skills, knowledge, opportunities, and desire to make wise lifestyle choices. No one else is present in the lives of America’s 50 million school-attending students as much as us. 50 MS is a moonshot vision that with us working together as a team is doable.

It’s time to seize upon the many ways each one of us can make 50 MS happen. I can’t do it for you and I can’t do it without you. It’s up to all of us if this is going to work. Just realize that while you delay, while we let school administrators, school boards, and policy-making legislators continue to be confused about the purpose of school physical and health education, respect for our profession and your future job security continues to diminish. 50 MS is our lifeline. Grasp it quickly before it disappears.