Tehachapi students: fitness levels fall short
Related Photos
Do Tehachapi students not get enough exercise? Tompkins students — where more emphasis has been placed on physical education — fared better than Golden Hills or Cummings Valley Schools in recent testing.
Less than half the students tested for physical fitness in Tehachapi recently passed the requirements -- a slight improvement over last year.
According to school documents, of the Tehachapi Unified School District students tested for the California Physical Fitness Test, 46 percent passed during the 2012 school year.
However, district-wide fitness scores exceed the state and county scores.
Since 1996, the California Education Code has required that each local educational agency administer the state-designated physical fitness test that is designed to represent minimum levels of fitness known to be associated with those health and physical characteristics that offer protection against diseases resulting from physical inactivity.
The physical assessment measures six aspects of a student's fitness levels and they must pass all of them to be considered fit. The categories are aerobic capacity, body composition, which issued to describe the percentages of fat, bone and muscle in human bodies, abdominal strength, trunk extension strength -- a movement that returns the trunk to the anatomical position a backward movement of the spine, upper body strength and flexibility.
The students were tested in grades fifth, seventh and ninth, with seventh graders out performing their fifth and ninth grade counterparts.
And while there were no significant differences between ethnic populations in regards to the fitness standards, there were some differences between male and female students.
Overall, males tested better in the categories of aerobic capacity and upper body strength, while females excelled in the areas of flexibility.
However, perhaps the biggest difference in levels of physical fitness could be seen between the district's three elementary schools, with 55 percent of Tompkins students passing in comparison to just 37.5 percent at Cummings Valley and 36 percent at Golden Hills.
Chief Administrator of Instructional Services and Technology Traci Minjares attributes that to Tompkins being the only elementary school in the district that has consistently maintained a Physical Education paraprofessional on staff during the same span.
Overall, the initial report showed the district excels in two categories -- trunk extension strength followed closely by abdominal strength. Meanwhile, areas of weakness were in aerobic capacity, upper body strength, and body composition.
However, the good news is only 20 percent of the students that failed are considered high risk for any category, with the majority just falling into the needs improvement zone.
"We are making sure that we are playing closer attention to identifying students that are not passing the tests, especially our ninth graders," Minjares said. "Technically those students should be evaluated again the next year as sophomores and we need to make sure that until they pass that physical education is part of their schedule."
The final statistics will complete in December.
Middle School honor roll report
Jacobsen Middle School Principal Susan Ortega said that out of 967 students, 475 made this year's honor roll with a grade point average of 3.0 or above, with a majority of those students being placed on the principal's honor roll with a minimum 3.8 GPA.
"It is no small feat to get an 'A' in some of our teacher's classes," Ortega said. "They are high quality classrooms where high expectations are held at all times, so I am so proud.'
As a reward, the students shared 27 dozen donuts as a reward.
