Schools
Saratoga High School's CrossFit Program Recognized
Elite campus receives California Distinguished School Award in part due to its excellent physical education program.
Editor's note: The following article was written by San Jose State University journalism student Janet Garcia as part of a class assignment. She welcomes your thoughts and feedback in the comments.
In regular physical education curricula, students can sometimes find related exercises a hassle and, in many ways, can fake their way through the courses.
Saratoga High School, however, known as an academic powerhouse, is now being recognized for its successful transformation of its physical education program into the CrossFit regimen began in 2008.
The idea to incorporate CrossFit into the school's curricula started with SHS physical education teacher Rick Ellis and former P.E. instructor Peter Jordan.
They started doing CrossFit workouts that Ellis had seen on crossfit.com, the main site for CrossFit. He then introduced the idea of implementing CrossFit to the school's P.E program.
CrossFit is a conditioning and strength fitness program that includes weightlifting, sprinting and different forms of athletic activities.
"CrossFit does a good job at teaching movements and it's progression based and a very smooth transition into the secondary school setting. Teaching small parts first and teaching kids how to move in a simple way and building on that,” explained Ellis.
The new fitness program started to be developed over the summer before the beginning of the new school year, Ellis said.
“We developed rubrics, minimum standards, assessment strategies and then we jumped into it. We implemented [it] full out across our whole P.E. program. No more traditional P.E. classes. Everything is fitness based and everybody is their own mini experiment,” Ellis added.
After five years, the CrossFit program is setting the standard.
This past spring, SHS once again received the California Distinguished School Award.
One of the reasons for the school's continued recognition is its exemplary fitness program, according to Ellis.
Ellis noted the most rewarding moments of his teaching job are, “When kids, for example, do their first pull-up, or they do a workout and I see a 90-pound freshman girl, who didn’t even have dead-lift in her vocabulary, do a body weight dead lift in perfect form."
He continued: "I can see kids come out of their shells and they create a stronger self-image [of themselves] and [have] more confidence. They are empowered and can do things they thought they couldn’t do.”
The program also encourages students to be more involved with athletics, Ellis said.
“If it wasn’t for the program, I wouldn’t have started working out and playing sports,” said Rio Harada, a senior who first started the CrossFit program in 2009.
Students take video of themselves to see if they are doing the exercises and movements correctly, Ellis said.
The best videos are posted on crossfitsawmill.com so students can see examples of how to do the movements, Ellis said.
In regular physical education curricula, students can sometimes find related exercises a hassle and, in many ways, can fake their way through the courses.
Saratoga High School, however, known as an academic powerhouse, is now being recognized for its successful transformation of its physical education program into the CrossFit regimen began in 2008.
The idea to incorporate CrossFit into the school's curricula started with SHS physical education teacher Rick Ellis and former P.E. instructor Peter Jordan.
They started doing CrossFit workouts that Ellis had seen on crossfit.com, the main site for CrossFit. He then introduced the idea of implementing CrossFit to the school's P.E program.
CrossFit is a conditioning and strength fitness program that includes weightlifting, sprinting and different forms of athletic activities.
"CrossFit does a good job at teaching movements and it's progression based and a very smooth transition into the secondary school setting. Teaching small parts first and teaching kids how to move in a simple way and building on that,” explained Ellis.
The new fitness program started to be developed over the summer before the beginning of the new school year, Ellis said.
“We developed rubrics, minimum standards, assessment strategies and then we jumped into it. We implemented [it] full out across our whole P.E. program. No more traditional P.E. classes. Everything is fitness based and everybody is their own mini experiment,” Ellis added.
After five years, the CrossFit program is setting the standard.
This past spring, SHS once again received the California Distinguished School Award.
One of the reasons for the school's continued recognition is its exemplary fitness program, according to Ellis.
Ellis noted the most rewarding moments of his teaching job are, “When kids, for example, do their first pull-up, or they do a workout and I see a 90-pound freshman girl, who didn’t even have dead-lift in her vocabulary, do a body weight dead lift in perfect form."
He continued: "I can see kids come out of their shells and they create a stronger self-image [of themselves] and [have] more confidence. They are empowered and can do things they thought they couldn’t do.”
The program also encourages students to be more involved with athletics, Ellis said.
“If it wasn’t for the program, I wouldn’t have started working out and playing sports,” said Rio Harada, a senior who first started the CrossFit program in 2009.
Students take video of themselves to see if they are doing the exercises and movements correctly, Ellis said.
The best videos are posted on crossfitsawmill.com so students can see examples of how to do the movements, Ellis said.
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