In most modern high schools, physical education is a full class, something to take when you’re not playing a sport and have a health or fitness-related elective to complete. Participants often sit in the stands and talk or play basketball without much enthusiasm.
However, there was a time in this country when physical education was taken more seriously, and it reached its absolute apex at La Sierra High School in Carmichael, California.
During the 1950s and 1960s, La Sierra boasted what was arguably the most rigorous physical education program in the country, if not the world. The so-called “La Sierra System” was born at a time when World War II had ended, the Cold War was still heating up, and prosperity and technological advances made life increasingly sedentary and comfortable. In this atmosphere, there was a national concern that Americans were becoming too soft, fat, and complacent not only to defend their country in war, but to meet the challenges of peace vigorously.
As President John F. Kennedy wrote in “The Mild American”:
Fitness is not only one of the most important keys to a healthy body; it is the basis of dynamic and creative intellectual activity. . . . [We] Learn what the Greeks knew: that intelligence and skill can only function to the best of their ability when the body is healthy and strong; that resistant spirits and hard minds usually inhabit healthy bodies.
In this sense, physical form is the basis of all activities in our society. And if our bodies become soft and inactive, if we don’t encourage physical development and dexterity, we will undermine our ability to think, to work, and to use those skills vital to a complex and expanding America.
Therefore, the physical fitness of our citizens is a vital prerequisite for realizing America’s full potential as a nation, and for the opportunity of each individual citizen to make full and fruitful use of his or her abilities.
Stop the physical deterioration of their fellow citizens and promote the idea of developing a healthy mind, in a healthy body, JFK used the President’s Council on Physical Fitness to revitalize physical education programs across the country, and looked to La Sierra as an example of what was possible along these lines.
The first few minutes of the video above will give you an idea of what some aspects of the La Sierra program were like.
The La Sierra System had been developed by World War II veteran Stan LeProtti, who was inspired by the classic “whole man” approach to fitness that had been championed by the ancient Greeks. LeProtti’s program sought to improve the strength, agility, balance, flexibility, power, and endurance, as well as leadership qualities, of all males in the student body, not just the relatively few boys who participated in athletics. organized. The program not only incorporated physical exercise, a regimen that included an intense 12-minute calisthenics warm-up, sports, games, dance, wrestling, gymnastics, running, water sports, and off-ground work on various apparatus such as pegboards. but it also involved regular meetings to talk about philosophy: the why – Behind that. The students were taught that the fitness routines they engaged in not only built their bodies, but also prepared their minds to learn and their spirits to face life’s setbacks.
The “Philosophy” section of the La Sierra Physical Education Manual includes both “Physical Conditioning” and “Psychological Conditioning” as two of the goals of the program, and lists the following among the goals of the latter:
- Pupils are systematically and deliberately asked to ‘go all out’ within their individual capacities in a series of physical development activities, thereby progressively increasing endurance and pain tolerance levels.
- Pupils develop a well-disciplined attitude towards the ‘hard work principle’ in terms of heavy activity and energy production.
When the producers of The Motivating Factor, a documentary about the La Sierra System, interviewed those who had experienced it in their youth, reported that the program had achieved exactly the desired effect, and that it stayed with them into adulthood; when these La Sierra graduates experienced challenges in later years, they returned to their physical education experiences as a touchstone, a reminder that they were capable of hard things.
Another unique trademark of the La Sierra System was its use of “skill grouping”, a hierarchy of ranks denoting different levels of physical proficiency. The boys were put into teams based on these levels, with each team/level identified by different colored satin briefs worn by their respective members (without shirts) while exercising. All freshmen started out on the White Team, wearing white shorts, and were then able to rise through the ranks throughout their high school years. When he got to the next level, he had to ditch his old colored shorts for new ones and proudly display his achievement. The color system was designed to take advantage of children’s natural propensity to competence and publicly recognized status as a spur to “physical excellence.”
One might wonder if this system wouldn’t embarrass and embarrass kids who were at a lower level of fitness and had to wear lower level shorts. Wouldn’t the color groups make them feel bad about having to convey their position at the bottom of the ladder?
A trainer at the time, Richard Chester Tucker, who later wrote his doctoral thesis on the La Sierra color system, investigated this very question. He compared the lowest-fit third of students in both La Sierra and a school that had a traditional physical education program. What he found was that there was no difference between the self-esteem of the boys in each group. But, the children from La Sierra were in better physical shape than those from the other school; for example, on average, the shortest third of children in La Sierra could do nine pull-ups, while the shortest third of children in the traditional physical education program could only do two. In other words, the color-coded shorts system didn’t make students feel bad about themselves, but it did inspire them to try harder; these kids might never be elite athletes, but the color coding system motivated them to become their better. As Tucker says in The Motivating Factor“We were the subject of a lot of criticism because [people said] ‘You’re making these kids walk around in white underpants. What does that do to your self-esteem? It makes them want to have red underpants!”
When interviewed as adults, those who went through the La Sierra program remembered it as fun and supportive; the boys encouraged each other and helped each other to reach the next level.
Within the color system, there were four main levels: White (Beginner), Red (Intermediate), Blue (Advanced), and Navy (Ultimate Athlete). Within the Blue level, there were two sub-levels: Purple and Gold. Over 90% of the students were able to advance from the White Team to the Red Team by the end of their first year, and 60% were eventually able to make it to the Blue Team. Out of every 100 students, only one or two were still wearing white boxer shorts when they graduated.
The following benchmarks had to be reached to go beyond the White Team and reach the following color levels within the La Sierra System.
Each color level had minimum, medium, and “ceiling” substandards; the maximum standard of one color level was the minimum standard of the next; Reaching the ceiling standard within a color level advanced you to the next color. What is listed below is the minimum standard for each primary color level:
Red (Intermediate)
- Pull-ups: 10
- Push-ups: 32
- Bar dips: 12
- Crunches: 60
- Standing Long Jump: 6’9″
- 200-yard dash: 34 seconds
- Rope Climb (18′, Standing Start) – Use Hands Only (No Feet)
- Agility run: 20 seconds
- 880-yard dash: 3 minutes
- Mile run: 7 minutes
- Lifting and carrying people: 880 yards
- Pegboard (vertical): 6 holes
- 50-yard swim (freestyle): 36 seconds
Blue (Advanced)
- Pull-ups: 14
- Push-ups: 48
- Bar-Dips: 18
- Standing Long Jump: 7’3″
- Hanging Leg Raises: 24
- 300-yard dash: 52 seconds
- Rope Climb (18′, Stand Start): 15 seconds, hands only
- Agility run: 19 seconds
- 1,320-yard dash: 4:20
- Man Lift and Carry: 1,320 yards
- Pegboard (Vertical): 1 trip
- Pushup extension: 5
- 1.5 mile run: 10:30
- 50-yard swim (freestyle): 32 seconds
Navy Blue (Ultimate Athlete)
The median and ceiling substandards within the blue tier were categorized as their own colors: purple and gold. In order to try out the navy blue chests, you first had to earn your gold chests.
- Pull-ups: 34
- Bar dips: 52
- Hand push-ups: 50
- alternative 1-arm Burpees (30 sec.): 26
- 300-yard shuttle run: 47.5 seconds
- Rope Climb (20′, hands only, seated start): 2 trips
- Agility run: 17 seconds
- Extension push-ups (8”): 100
- Pegboard (Vertical): 5 trips
- Handstand: 45 seconds
- Man Lift and Carry: 5 miles
- Mile run: 5:15
- 5 Mile Jog – Finish
- Obstacle Course: Complete
- Swim (Prone Position): 1 mile
- Swim (underwater): 50 yards
- Swim (any combination of strokes): 2 miles
- Run front hanging float with tied arms and ankles (deep water): 6 minutes
- Stay afloat in deep water in an upright position (use of arms and legs allowed within an 8-foot circle): 2 hours
Representing the pinnacle of physical fitness, the navy blue shorts were obviously extremely difficult to earn, and as a result very coveted When a student won his Navy trunks, his achievement was announced over the school’s public address system, and the entire student body erupted in thunderous applause.
Between 1958 when the Navy level was introduced and 1983 when La Sierra High School closed, only 21 students were able to achieve these trunks. Today, the standard remains a testament to a time that had high expectations for its youth, that believed in their potential and pushed them to achieve as much as they could.
Listen to this episode of the AoM podcast for more information about the La Sierra PE program:
