In order to graduate, Roosevelt students are required to complete 1.5 credits of Physical Education, or PE. It is possible to avoid taking PE courses in high school, but a waiver is needed. To earn this waiver, a verified 80 hours of exercise from a school or club sports team are necessary, unless you are unable to due to an injury or religious reasons.
Kari Heinz, a Roosevelt counselor, explains that students need to earn three PE waivers in order to satisfy the graduation requirements. Students can earn a single PE waiver by completing a full season of a Roosevelt sport. A student may also earn a waiver by logging 80 hours of activity if they are involved in a Roosevelt club or an activity outside of Roosevelt, as long as it has a performance or competitive aspect.
Both PE logs and waivers must be submitted to counselors prior to graduation. Heinz says that the most common way Roosevelt students meet the graduation requirement is by either taking Roosevelt PE classes or using PE waivers.
If a waiver form is not submitted, those 1.5 credits of PE must be completed, which equates to a year and a half of physical education. Roosevelt provides several different course options that qualify as physical education, including Personal Fitness, Weight Training/Conditioning, Lifetime Activities, Team Sports, and Adaptive PE.
PE classes are still going strong virtually. The counselors say that teachers are working hard to make classes fun and engaging. When asked if students have gravitated towards or away from online physical education classes, Heinz reports that PE classes were still full this year, as always, because “the graduation requirement has not gone away, so students still need to complete their credits.”
If you are not taking any PE courses at Roosevelt, students may also use Running Start to complete their PE credits at the college they are attending. If a student has a full academic course load and is not able to complete any of these options for PE credit – and has never had a reduced schedule or been a TA – they may be eligible for an academic waiver starting the second semester of their junior year. However, Heinz says this must be discussed with a counselor.
One way or another, each student needs to make sure that they fulfill these credits before they reach their graduation day, or they will not be receiving a diploma. It can be an easy requirement to overlook, so students should pay attention to their schedule and make sure they are completing all of the necessary requirements to graduate.
