Youth failing fitness test

The fitness level among the youths of California is a cause of real concern for us. According to the released results of state’s annual fitness test on Friday, it has been found that the majority of California students are too big, too slow, and too weak to be called real fit. It is astonishing to know that like the figures of last year, around 3 out of 4 students could not perform all six of the physical tasks required to pass the exam. It clearly puts a question mark on the work that government and other authorities are doing to make the students achieve that fitness level.

The activities that students were asked to do for this test included: sit-ups, push-ups, and stretches. The body fat of the students was also calculated. It was noticed that the aerobic workout was the hardest thing that the students were asked to do. The test was conducted on around 1.3 million students of grade 5, 7, and 9. About 43% of these students could not perform the tasks that included running or walking a mile within a certain period of time. The time was different for different grades; however, the outcome was almost similar.

The school teachers and gym instructors should be concerned about these statistics, as it does not reveal a good picture. More efforts and orientations programs might be needed to make students aware about the importance of fitness level that they need to achieve so that they can lead a healthy life. Different types of ailments are scaring us almost every day, and we need to make sure that we have appropriate body strength to fight against such diseases and ailments. We as parents and care-takers should also be concerned to make our wards aware about what they have to achieve and what efforts they need to put in to realize those goals.