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Still building Americancharacter: sport andthe physical educationcurriculumC. Roser Rees aa Department of Health Studies, PhysicalEducation and Human Performance Science ,Adelphi University , Garden City, New YorkPublished online: 28 Jul 2006.

To cite this article: C. Roser Rees (1997) Still building American character: sportand the physical education curriculum, The Curriculum Journal, 8:2, 199-212,DOI: 10.1080/0958517970080202

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THE CURRICULUM JOURNAL Vol. 8 No. 2

Still building Americancharacter: sport and the

physical education curriculum

C. ROGER REESDepartment of Health Studies, Physical Education and Human Performance

Science, Adelphi University, Garden City, New York

ABSTRACT

This paper describes a 'local' reaction to the global theme that 'sport builds character'.It shows how the emphasis on winning in sports has led to the growth of a uniquesystem of interscholastic athletics in American schools which provides importantsocialization experiences for students and acts as entertainment for the community. Isuggest that the founders of physical education in America used the popularity of sportto establish their subject as a legitimate component of secondary education, and arguethat the current popularity of athletics is now undermining that legitimacy. To supportthis claim, I give examples of how the system of athletics can compromise the currentreform efforts in physical education which use sports as a medium to develop self-responsibility and raise moral issues.

KEYWORDS

sport; physical education; curriculum; USA; socialization.

INTRODUCTION

In a recent article, Evans and Penney (1995) described the role played by whatBernstein (1990) has called 'the official pedagogic discourse' (OPD) of con-temporary society in framing the debate over what aspects of physical edu-cation should be included in the British National Curriculum. Specifically,they showed how the Conservative government in the UK manipulated theOPD that sport builds character and helps to counter social problems, to raise

The Curriculum Journal Vol 8 No 2 Summer 1997 199-212© British Curriculum Foundation 1997 ISSN 0958-5176

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team sports to a privileged position in relation to other aspects of physicaleducation. In reality, Evans and Penney argued, this reductive philosophy (i.e.reducing physical education to sports, and sports to competitive team games)actually compromises the ability of physical education to meet the needs ofmost children.

This scenario has a familiar ring to it in North America, where an almostmythological belief in the social value of team sports is a 'well-entrenched' com-ponent of the OPD about education in general and physical education in par-ticular. The role of sport in physical education is the subject of this paper. In itI will briefly review the historical antecedents of this relationship. I will arguethat the 'educational' value of team sports in America, originally based onBritish ideas of muscular Christianity, underwent an 'American' metamorpho-sis in which the importance of winning in sport, instead of merely participating,was seen as the principal way 'character' was learned and demonstrated.Winning in sport was made even more important because of the intense com-munity interest in high school interscholastic athletics,1 and its role as an impor-tant 'consensual' ritual within the school (Rees, 1995). This popularity reducesthe perception that physical education is an important force in the social edu-cation of youth, since athletics is seen as already performing that function. Theemphasis on competitive team games means that sports skills usually comprisea major portion of the physical education curriculum. Finally, the popularityof athletics reduces opportunities for curriculum reform in physical educationsince it encourages an uncritical acceptance of the status quo.

W I N N I N G IN SPORT BUILDS CHARACTER

Although it is beyond the scope of this paper to trace in detail the origin anddevelopment of the myth that sport builds character,2 an overview is presentedhere, since it was this myth which laid the foundation for current OPD aboutsport both in Britain and in America. Briefly, there is general agreementamong scholars that a belief in the character building value of participating inteam sports precipitated a growth of athleticism in private schools for boys inthe mid- to late nineteenth century in Britain (Dunning, 1971; Mangan, 1981).Team games were supposed to instil 'manly' characteristics, defined as grouployalty, physical toughness and self-reliance. Qualities such as these werenecessary in order for boys to survive the spartan discipline of public schoollife, and think of themselves as socially elite, ready for leadership at home andabroad.3 There is also consensus that the cult of athleticism became one of thecornerstones of the British Empire, since the British used the public schoolmodel to develop schools for the sons of the colonial elites, and staffed theseschools with teachers who often advocated athleticism (Guttmann, 1994;Mangan, 1992).

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In the United States, exclusive boarding schools based on the British modelwere developed during the mid- to late nineteenth century. Athleticismfigured prominently in these schools and was believed to perform the samefunctions as in Britain, extending institutional control, providing surrogateparents for the boys, teaching 'manliness', and developing leaders. As inBritain, compulsory team games became the medium through which thesecharacteristics were developed (Armstrong, 1984; Bundgaard, 1985). At thesame time there was also great value attached to victory (Bundgaard, 1985;Mirel, 1982), an emphasis which apparently differed from the 'play-up-and-play-the game' philosophy4 popular in Britain at the time (Bundgaard, 1985).Social historian Donald Mrozek (1983) has traced the origins of this 'victoryphilosophy' in sport to the spirit of social efficiency, the idea that individualscould work together like the parts of a machine to produce tangible results.Victory in sports was seen as 'the greatest of all manifestations of socialefficiency' (Mrozek, 1983: 81), and was used by political leaders of the timesuch as Theodore Roosevelt and Henry Cabot Lodge as a metaphor forvictory by the nation in a broader context. Sports, particularly 'American'team sports such as baseball and football, gave the opportunity for action, andas a result of this action, success and victory (Mrozek, 1983). Winning in sportbecame an 'American' tradition symbolizing both moral superiority andnational dominance (Park, 1987).

The 'winning philosophy' quickly developed in American universities wheresport became the concern of two groups of 'new experts' in physical culture,coaches and physical educators. These groups held different views about theeducational use of sport. While physical educators valued sport 'to aid the sci-entifically efficient upgrading of the body' (Mrozek, 1983: 73), and as a meansof increasing the physical fitness of all students, coaches were preoccupied withthe idea of winning teams to such an extent that the 'character building' valueof sport was not emphasized by them. By the turn of the century professionalcoaches began to replace recently graduated students as the leaders of collegiatesports teams. This change was based on the belief that only coaching expertisecould make the difference between defeat and victory. Mrozek comments thatin this vision of sport, 'moral renewal was not the business of the athletic coach-winning was' (Mrozek, 1983:74-5).5 As 'winning-in-sport' became the domi-nant philosophy, coaches became an increasingly important part of the systemof intercollegiate athletics, but they held an ambivalent position in academia.Often from lower-class origins, and possessing no academic credentials, theirsocial backgrounds were very different from most of the faculty. Being hiredto achieve immediate unequivocal success (i.e. winning) meant that they weresubject to more pressure than their faculty colleagues. At the same time theyoften had much more power than the physical educators to influence thedevelopment of athletics at the university, a fact which lay behind the latter'scriticism that college sport was too competitive (Mrozek, 1983: 101-2).

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Concern over the need to 'build character' among youth was high becauseof the perception that urbanization and immigration were threatening'American' values (Cavallo, 1981: 124; Rader, 1983:148). Organizations suchas the Playground Movement (Cavallo, 1981) and the Young Men's ChristianAssociation were created to socialize urban youth, but by the second decadeof the twentieth century this socializing function was seen as the domain ofthe school. The value of sports in secondary education was recognized in a1919 report entitled 'The Cardinal Principles of Secondary Education', devel-oped by a special committee of the National Education Association. Athleticgames were suggested as important activities through which the teaching ofsocial values such as co-operation, social cohesion and social solidarity couldbe achieved. These values were deemed to be essential for coping with modernlife (Miracle and Rees, 1994: 62-3).

Secondary schools were able to use such policy statements to justify thedevelopment of interscholastic athletics which replicated the organizationalstructure of intercollegiate athletics and the winning philosophy behind it.Responsibility for the management of sport was taken from the students andplaced in the hands of adult coaches who also had teaching and/or adminis-trative duties (Spring, 1974). The popularity of team sports all acrossAmerica was reflected in the growing identification of local communitieswith their high school sports teams, particularly if those teams were winning.For example, Stone (1981) noted the importance of high school basketball inthe Lynd's 1929 study of 'Middletown', and in Hollinshead's study of'Elmtown' in the 1940s. More recent descriptions of the centrality of highschool football to community life in rural Texas (Bissinger, 1990; Foley,1990) and the importance of basketball in urban communities (Frey, 1994;Joravsky, 1995) show that the identity with school sports is widespread inAmerica. These studies also show the centrality of winning to this identity.Character is still being built in high school sports teams, provided thoseteams are successful.

This section has briefly reviewed the development in America of the OPDthat winning in sport builds character. I have suggested that the originalBritish philosophy of 'play up and play the game' was changed to reflect theinvention of what were perceived to be 'American' traditions.6 As part ofthis process, interscholastic athletics took on a unique organizational struc-ture in America, one which is largely intact in contemporary schools. Thecentrality of athletics to the social life of the school,7 and the existence ofcoaches whose main responsibility is to produce sports teams that win gamesfor the entertainment of the local community, is evidence of the power ofthis institution. The relationship between interscholastic sports and con-temporary curriculum reform in physical education is the subject of the nextsection.

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PHYSICAL EDUCATION A N D SPORT IN SECONDARYEDUCATION

There is little evidence that involvement in school sports, as they are currentlyorganized, has much effect (either positive or negative) on the 'character' ofhigh school athletes, no matter whether this effect is defined as some sort ofpersonality change in the individual, or in sports-specific terms such as acommitment to fair play or moral growth, or more generally as a counter tojuvenile delinquency (see reviews by Miracle and Rees, 1994; and Rees andMiracle, in press). However, the value of athletics is widely accepted amongstudents, coaches, educational administrators and community leaders. As aconsequence, sport exerts considerable influence on all aspects of physicaleducation in schools. In this section I will consider three related issues: theprofessional preparation of high school coaches; the relationship between theteaching and coaching role of physical education teachers; and the status ofsports skills in the physical education curriculum.

The professional preparation of high school coaches

Criticism of the professional development (or lack of it) of coaches is acommon theme in the contemporary physical education literature (e.g. Connand Razor, 1989; Martens, 1988; Sisley, 1984; Sisley and Weise, 1987; Stewartand Sweet, 1992). For example, Martens (1988) estimated that 2.5 million of the3 million coaches responsible for youth sport had no background in educationor sports sciences. Although the majority of these coaches are volunteers incommunity-based programmes and are not coaching in schools, the impres-sion is given that the only qualifications necessary for coaching are an interestin children and in sport.8 High school coaches are usually required to have abackground in education. Specifically, twenty-five states require all coaches tohave a teaching certificate, but in twelve states neither teaching nor coachingcertification is required (Sisley and Weise, 1987). However, critics are con-cerned that, under pressure to fill coaching jobs, school administrators allowexceptions to certification rules, and hire 'off-the-street' coaches with no back-ground in education or physical education, and no other responsibilities in theschool (Broderick, 1985; Conn and Razor, 1989; Sisley, 1984). Such practicesreinforce the view that 'on-the-job' training is what is necessary for successfulcoaching, and that academic credentials are superfluous. Accepting the posi-tive social value of sport is part of that on-the-job training through which themyth that sports builds character is sustained, and with it the emphasis on com-petitive team games.

Behind this criticism is frustration over the failure of physical educators toexert control over the credentialing process of coaches. In a survey of 228 high

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school coaches in the state of Montana, Stewart and Sweet found that 89 percent were teachers in their respective schools, but only 31 per cent were teach-ing physical education. Forty-two per cent of the coaches made errors insimple nutritional questions while 40 per cent could not identify the propersequence in the rehabilitation of an injury. The authors concluded that themajority of the coaches in their sample were lacking in 'the basic, up-to-dateinformation required to properly train young athletes', and suggested that thisinformation is available in sports science courses typically offered in collegephysical education programmes (Stewart and Sweet, 1992: 78).

Requiring university students to take sports science courses as part of theirpreparation for coaching may privilege this 'scientific' knowledge relative toon-the-job training, but it will not necessarily lead coaches to question thecharacter building value of school sports as a necessary precursor to meaning-ful reform in physical education. Sports science programmes are often sepa-rated from the pedagogy programmes which train teachers. Furthermore,these programmes tend to have a bioscience base which often precludes criti-cal examination of social issues in sport (Sage, 1987a). For example, the resultsof a national survey of physical education administrators responsible forteacher preparation in four-year colleges showed that sociology of sport com-petencies was not perceived to be important, neither were future physical edu-cation teachers required to take courses in this field. Only 7 per cent of theteacher preparation programmes required sociology of sport courses, while afurther 19 per cent included some sociology of sport information within othercourses (Southard, 1982). None of the courses completed by the respondentsin Stewart and Sweet's study would have required the participants to questionthe underlying sports creed or the privileged position of competitive teamsports within it. A similar acceptance of this status quo was found in thecoaching certification programmes described by Sisley and Weise (1987).Material on the ethical and moral development of athletes was not included.

In summary, while physical educators may be justified in their criticism thatcoaches are ill prepared professionally, certification programmes developedby physical education administrators at the university level may not solve theproblem. If physical education teachers who want to coach are not exposedto alternative models of sport at university, they are not likely to experiencethem in their capacity as teachers and coaches in high school.

Teaching roles and coaching roles in high school PE teachers

The role of the coach in American interscholastic athletics is unique. No othereducational system in the world contains a group of people whose majorresponsibility is to win games for the institution and the community, and jus-tifies the goal of victory in educational terms. American coaches are heldaccountable for the outcomes of spontaneous, unpredictable events performed

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publicly by male (and more recently female) adolescents and/or young adults(Edwards, 1973; Coakley, 1994). They are judged on objective criteria ofsuccess and failure (i.e. win/loss record) to a far greater extent than any othergroup in education. The ultimate price of failure can be the loss of their jobs.While these characteristics are particularly salient at the college level, wherewinning in sports can garner millions of dollars for the university from tele-vision revenue, logo franchising and gate receipts, they also apply to many highschools in communities where school sports provide the principal form of com-munity identity. Even when high school coaches are tenured members of thefaculty, they can experience much higher levels of stress than other educators.

At the high school level this stress takes its toll on coaches in the form ofrole strain experienced by conflicting expectations from different groups suchas educational administrators, parents, fans and teaching colleagues, and roleconflict caused by the time demands of teaching and coaching. This tensionoften leads to strain in family relationships in which male coaches (invariablythe subject of this research) neglect their family responsibilities (Sage, 1987b).Empirical studies of high school coaches (e.g. Massingale, 1981; Sage, 1987b)have also shown that coaches often devoted the majority of their time tocoaching at the expense of their responsibilities as teachers. They realize thatthey are more likely to be fired for having losing seasons than for poor teach-ing performance so they commit the major portion of their time and energyto coaching (Massingale, 1981).

The situation described above can have a negative impact on physicaleducation at the high school level in several ways. Since many coaches arealso physical education teachers, neglecting their teaching responsibilitiesbecause of an emphasis on coaching sends subtle messages to the studentbody and to the community about the relative importance of athletics andphysical education. School districts can exercise the option of exempting highschool athletes from physical education classes which are required activitiesfor the other students. This policy further marginalizes physical education asa school subject. Coaches are also less likely than other physical educationteachers to consider curriculum reform, because this involves devoting timeto educating themselves on educational issues, time which must be takenfrom coaching. Since most coaches have themselves been successful athletesin high school and college, they are often socialized into the dominant sportphilosophy that winning in sports builds character. If this philosophy has notbeen challenged during their university coursework (and the evidence citedabove suggests that discussion of such issues is the exception rather than therule in physical education programmes), they can hardly be expected todevelop a critical view of sports in the 'real world' of coaching. Finally,having been successful athletes themselves, they are quite likely to supportthe concept of team sports as the basis of the high school curriculum in physi-cal education.

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The status of sport in the physical education curriculum

Sport played an important role in the origin and development of school physi-cal education programmes in America in the early decades of the twentiethcentury. It was seen as a vehicle to socialize youth, and this argument was usedby the fathers of physical education to establish their subject as an importantcomponent of secondary education. In the famous words of Jesse FieringWilliams, physical education was 'education through the physical' which buildscharacter, rather than just 'education of the physical' by which physical fitnessis increased (see Siedentop, 1990: chaps 2 and 3 for a review). Sports skillsbecame the main component of the physical education curriculum as a resultof the La Porte committee report in 1938 which advocated a block approach inwhich different sports skills were taught in three- or six-week units culminat-ing in game play. Siedentop has noted (1990: 50) that 'this model became the(his italics) prototype for the education-through-the-physical curriculum inphysical education, and remains the dominant model to this day.'

However, Siedentop (1987: 80) has also pointed out that students generallyfind the physical education curriculum to be boring, including the sportsportion of this curriculum, an interesting problem since they usually find inter-scholastic athletics to be exciting.9 He located the reason for this paradox in theisolated, decontextualized nature of sport in the physical education curriculum,where skills are learned in a vacuum without the opportunities for formal com-petition and affiliation found in interscholastic athletics.10 These shortcomingsled him to develop his sport education model which adapts some of the charac-teristics of athletics to the teaching of sports skills in physical education(Siedentop, 1987; Siedentop, Mand and Taggart, 1986). In this model, skills aretaught within 'seasons' which are longer than the traditional units of the LaPorte system. Opportunities for affiliation are provided by a club system whichlasts for the season. There is formal competition in the form of a league sched-ule and a round-robin format. Individual and team records are kept, and theseason ends with a culminating event to decide the 'winner'. Finally, there areopportunities for the students to take on different sports-related roles duringthe season, such as leader, referee and scorekeeper (Siedentop, 1987).

The sport education model has maintained the excitement of sports com-petition, but has eliminated the adult control of outcomes institutionalized inthe coaching role. For example, in the sport education model, teams are madeas even as possible in order to promote close competition. In interscholasticathletics, coaches often recruit potentially superior athletes with the goal ofgetting a team with the highest possible skill level so as to increase the chancesof victory. Also, by eliminating adult coaches, the sport education modelmakes students responsible for organizing the programme. The physical edu-cation teachers facilitate learning and do not coach (see Alexander, Taggart andThorpe, 1996).

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There is evidence that adolescents find such changes both challenging andenjoyable. In their study of what makes high school students feel positiveabout their lives, Chalip and his associates found that adolescents associatedphysical activity with higher-than-average challenges. However, it was infor-mal sports rather than adult-controlled, highly organized formal sports whichelicited the highest positive associations between challenges and skills. Theauthors reasoned that these results were due to the fact that when they werein control, the adolescents could manipulate the balance between challengesand skills more easily (Chalip, Csikszentmihalyi, Kleiber and Larson, 1984).Indeed, extensive field testing in New Zealand (Grant, 1992) and Australia(Alexander, Taggart and Thorpe, 1996) has shown student enjoyment to beone of many advantages that the sport education model has over more tra-ditional methods of teaching sports skills.

Since the sport education model does keep games as the medium for theinstruction of sport skills, and does allow for negative sum competitionssimilar to the structure of athletics, it is less 'revolutionary' than other reformapproaches in physical education.11 However, it may still be perceived as athreat by high school coaches who teach physical education because of theelimination of the coaching role. That the acceptance of the model has beenwidespread in other countries in which the coaching profession has not beeninstitutionalized at the high school level to the extent that it is in America maybe coincidental. On the other hand, the fact that it is so difficult to initiatechange in high school physical education, especially on the subject of 'char-acter development' (see Miracle and Rees, 1994) is a tribute to the strength ofthe myth that competitive team sports already provide these positive experi-ences.

CONCLUSION

The ideology that participation in sport, or more specifically winning in sport,in and of itself leads to positive social growth or 'character development'among the participants is widely accepted as the justification for contempor-ary interscholastic athletics. Critics of this ideology argue that sport in and ofitself does not necessarily produce positive experiences, and that if outcomessuch as sportsmanship, fair play or self-responsibility are important, then theyneed to be planned and rewarded as part of sport, rather than just left tochance. Although the goals of positive social development are invariably partof the 'mission statements' of athletic programmes, these goals are rarelyassessed. Neither is evidence of such behaviour rewarded to the same extentas victory.

Programmes in physical education which use the medium of sport toencourage personal growth or raise moral issues can be undercut by the

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widespread belief that these outcomes already occur in interscholasticathletics. For example, contemporary physical education reform in New YorkState is part of the 'Compact for Learning', a state-wide initiative developedfor all curriculum subjects. The goal is to give local school districts much morecontrol over curriculum issues, in collaboration with groups of interestedparents. Advocates of physical education suggest that the subject could havea lifelong impact on the 'wellness' and the social development of students(NYSAHPED position paper on adult roles, 1992). However, the oppor-tunity for the curriculum to reflect these needs is compromised if physicaleducation teachers are not motivated to develop new programmes. There isalso the perception among some parents that reforms will reduce the oppor-tunity for skill development, thereby reducing the chances of their childrenattaining athletic scholarships to universities.12

The 'sports builds character' ideology is a global phenomenon that hasimportant implications for physical education. This ideology helps determinewhat counts as important pedagogical knowledge in physical education, whoshould impart this knowledge, and how it should be delivered via physicaleducation curricula. In this paper I have demonstrated one 'local' variation tothis general theme, with the case of interscholastic sport in America. I haveargued that the OPD about the value of winning in sport was developed inthe early nineteenth century and was used by the leaders of physical educationto establish their subject as an important component of secondary education.This has led to the privileged position of team sports in contemporary physi-cal education, a situation which, I suggest, now compromises much-neededcurriculum reform.

NOTES

1 The term 'athletics' in America is used in a much broader context than in Britain.High school interscholastic athletics encompasses all organized sports competi-tions at the high school level.

2 See Miracle and Rees (1994: chap. 2) for a more thorough review.3 Victorian and Edwardian medical theories about female physical development held

that subjecting adolescent girls to high levels of physical and mental activity duringpuberty would endanger their sexual development. However, moderate exercisewas deemed valuable in the development of moral qualities for girls, and would alsohelp them become 'fit' mothers and produce physically healthy and morally soundchildren (McCrone, 1987; Park, 1987).

4 The term 'play up and play the game' is taken from the poem 'Vitai Lampada' pub-lished by Sir Henry Newbold in 1897. This poem captures the essence of schoolsports within the philosophy of muscular Christianity (see Miracle and Rees, 1994:35-6).

5 The idea that sport builds character is now an important component of the currentideology of intercollegiate athletics in America, and is used to justify the so-called

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'amateur' status of what is, in some universities, quasi-professional sport. To quotea recent report, 'Games and sports are educational in the best sense of the wordbecause they teach the participants and the observer new truths about testingoneself and others, about the enduring values of challenge and response, aboutteamwork, discipline and perseverance' (Knight Foundation Commission onIntercollegiate Athletics, 1991: 3). Despite this rhetoric, the importance of victoryin college athletics is paramount. 'Winning basketball games', the saying goes, 'isnot a matter of life or death. It's much more important than that.'

6 Hobsbawm's (1983) concept of 'invented tradition' is valuable in explaining howOPDs of sport are developed globally and locally. For a discussion of how the'British' tradition of fair play was 'invented' through sport, see Maguire (1994).

7 Many rituals unique to American schools such as the pep rally and homecomingreinforce the importance of victory in sports (see Foley, 1990; Miracle and Rees,1994: chap. 3; Rees, 1995).

8 There are now a number of programmes available which offer assistance to volun-teers who coach in community programmes. For an example of one of these seeRees, Feingold and Barrette (1991).

9 Although beyond the scope of this paper, there are other reasons for the low statusof physical education in schools at a time when, in the private sector, interest in sportand the body is so high. Interesting reviews of the status of physical education havebeen made by Crum, 1993; Locke, 1992; and Sparks, Templin and Schempp, 1990.

10 Siedentop also criticizes the trend among physical education programmes in col-leges to discount the importance of sport skills and concentrate on a more schol-arly, subdisciplinary approach. Evidence in support of this development wasprovided in the research by Southard referred to earlier. This research showed thatalthough teaching lifetime sports received the highest score for inclusion in thecourse offerings of teacher preparation programmes, administrators actually gaveit one of the lowest status ratings (Southard, 1983). In other words, courses on howto teach sports are widespread at the university level, but they are not valued bycurriculum experts in physical education.

11 Space limitations preclude a detailed review of such reform proposals. However,one of the most well-thought-out programmes for promoting moral growththrough physical education is Hellison's 'self-responsibility' model (Hellison,1993; Hellison and Templin, 1991). In it, competition and skill development areseen as means to the ends of progress through different levels of responsibility,rather than ends in and of themselves. It is an example of (moral) education throughthe physical (sport).

12 Dr. Judy Harris, Director for Athletics and Physical Education for West Seneca,New York, and a leading advocate for the Compact reforms, has recently met agroup of parents who voiced this concern (telephone interview, 6 January 1997).

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