Empowering Student Leadership

It's amazing what students can do when we give them the chance. One of the questions we have to ask ourselves is 'how can their leadership skills best meet the needs of the school' - or more specifically, the athletic or physed department?

Every strong intramural program that I know of has strong student leadership. These students do not have to be athlete's - as long as they are organized and responsible, they will do a great job with your intramural program. Here are some tips for organizing your student leadership group:

- have a group relevant to the size of your program; if you plan to do intramurals 3X a week have at least 9 - 10 students; this way the students can be put in groups of 3 and be responsible for one day per week

- set up an application process for those interested; you may choose to interview the candidates or just pick them
- make sure that you always have at least 50% returning for next year; therefore it is important not to have just senior students on your council

- make sure the students on your council are also playing in the program
- reward your student leaders; a t-shirt, pizza lunches, and recognizing their efforts are very important
- allow them to make decisions; let them be creative

Strong student leadership takes a large amount of the work and responsibility off the teacher. They will do the set up, officiating, PR and whatever else factors into your program.

It takes a co-operation and team work to run a quality intramural program. Make sure that your students are put of this effort!

Successful Schools

Over the past month, two elementary schools in Guelph have gone from no intramurals to full programs that are thriving. Victory PS and Sacred Heart Catholic School are perfect examples of how a team approach can make intramurals happen.

In both schools, the principals have taken a lead role in the intramural implementation. In addition to support from teacher's (more than one) and parents, the programs are well organized and supervised with little strain on the staff. Both schools have also empowered a student leadership group - their sports association or intramural council - to take leadership positions on a daily basis. These senior students are responsible for setting up the gym, officiating the games and making announcements and posters to advertise the program.

The principals at both schools cannot believe the number of students who show up every day to play. The great thing about these schools is that it took only a matter of weeks to get the programs up and running from scratch.

Both schools are sending students to the Raise the Bar student leadership conference in the fall and both are also scheduled to be part of the Raise the Bar staff leadership workshops in April, May and June.

If you have questions, comments or a success story - please share!

The Challenge in Physed

How do we get more students involved in healthy activities that will enhance their chances of being healthy and active for a lifetime? This is the question that has been asked for years - and one that educators are still struggling with.

At the end of the day, we must ask ourselves - 'how do we make physed and related activities relevant to the school population?' How many students see physed and the extra - curricular programs as something that they can get involved with? Does what we offer meet their needs?

Some schools and school boards do a great job providing inclusive opportunities for students, but on the whole, schools continue to prioritize extra-curricular programming around the elite athletes and the school teams. This approach is no different than the english department running extra help sessions for the honour roll students. Does that make sense? We continue to focus the majority of our attention on the students who need our assistance the least. Will this approach allow us to answer the opening question above? Does this mean that we should do away with school sports?

No, not at all, but we must take a serious look at what we offer the rest of the school population - the students who are not involved in either physed or extra - curriculars. This is where intramural and other inclusive programs come into play. By creating a 'total health and physical education' model at your school involving the curriculum, varsity sport teams and intramurals we can offer programs and opportunities relevant to every student.

Welcome!

Welcome to the Raise the Bar intramurals blog. I will be posting comments and observations related to physical activity and the building of better intramural programs throughout the province. Your comments and ideas are welcome!