T&F in Canada

[lukesteer93]

Alright guys, I'm writing a persuasive essay on the state of track and field in Canada, so it's time to do your thing.

My topic is "The state of track and field in Canada"

I'm arguing that Canadians in track and field should be given more;

- funding
- exposure
- higher level of competition

etc, etc.

Any thoughts or ideas?

[robkitz]

what do you mean by "should"?
From whose perspective?
Towards what end?
Which "Canadians in Track & Field"?

[gnardog]

Dude, I hate to break it to you but there are already countless threads on this board about these topics. I suggest you look through them first and bring back a more focused question. Probably you will find more ideas than you can possibly use, and answers to questions you haven't even thought of yet.

[Cummings]

See Kitz's post.

I would hate to be your English teacher trying to find out what your thesis is. You need to be way more specific with what you are trying to present. What are you even arguing? Why should athletes be given more funding today? In comparison to whom? What athletes are we talking about? Be specific. What is the funding, exposure, and access to higher levels of competition for? Are you arguing the state is in good shape or bad shape? And again, is it in a good state or bad state in comparison to a certain time period? Another nation?

Don't expect focused suggestions if you can't provide focused requests for information.

[lukesteer93]

well cummings, seeing as it's just a brainstorm, it doesn't matter if i've developed a sppecific thesis, i'm just trying to get some general idea on the topic so I can develop a thesis that has my 3 strongest points. I'm sure you're familiar with the concept. i'm arguing that canadians aren't being given enough funding/exposure etc., in comparisen to other countries sending athletes to international meets and achieving high results. im primarily looking at out state compared to other countries situatiion, rather than us vs. ourselves a few years prior.

kitz,
this is from a runner's pov
the goal would be a sort of scaled down version of "own the podium", a scenario where canada has a higher quantity of runners achieving good results at international meets.
and by canadians in track and field, i mean canada's elite runners.

gnardog, i realize there are many threads where this subject has arisen, but rather than picking through post after post, i'd rather have one specific place wherethe matter is discussed

thanks for your time, i appreciate your input (including the constructive criticism)

[gnardog]

Right... so essentially you want us to collect thoughts that already exist on this website and by posting them here save you the minimal trouble of 'researching' them. Get real.

[slapchop]

k dr.phil take it easy, I would actually enjoy reading these replies in an organized thread

[gnardog]

Terrible. I shouldn't spare the minimal effort but I'm going to refer you to the NCAA thread. You can make a fantastic paper out of that.

[lukesteer93]

if you think i'd actually use the tnf north thread as "research", you've got to be kidding. i'm not sure what you think research constitutes, but there is no way i would cite a tnf post in my essay.. that's quite the average dropper right there.

i'm merely looking for the thoughts of other members of this thread as i go about brainstorming, i'm not looking for anyone to "do my research" or "write my paper".

i'm not sure what i've done to bother you so greatly, but take your hostilities to somewhere where they're wanted, because this thread sure isn't the place.

thanks

[Cummings]

Fair enough Luke. Not trying to take a shot at you; attempting to help direct your thoughts so we can give you some more valuable input. It isn't much help to you if all we give you are broad sweeping statements that any monkey could string together to create a weak argument. Good luck with your essay.

[lukesteer93]

Don't worry cummings, i recognize the difference between constructive criticism argumentative remarks. Once you and robkitz commented i realized there were a lot of holes in question, and that just becuase i know what im saying, doesn't necessarily mean you know what i'm saying.

is anyone knowledgeable about the current american approach/thoughts on said approach? the kenyan approach is interesting, but the american approach might yield a higher degree of contrast, seeing as they're our neighbours and population aside, quite cultutally similar.

[STIkS]

I think a good country to focus on is Australia. Since the 1980s Australia has spent a very large amount of money on National Sports. Just take a look at their total medal count at every summer games from 1980 to 2008. It would be pretty interesting to know what it would look if you could figure out a $/medal value. I'm going to venture to say that this would take a large amount of research, probably not suitable for your essay. As well, I would say that trying to isolate dollars spent on T&F in any country's sport budget would be a nightmare.
An American vs. Canadian vs. Kenyan sounds like a bit of a nightmare too. The myriad of cultural, political, climatic and economic factors that infulence each country's approach would make an apples to apples comparison very tough.
Arguing something very specific might suit you better. Such as Funding for World Cross 2010. Not to mention there is a very solid thread with a boat load of information from a month ago.

[bdeacon]

Here's a good topic for you... compare the time of the 10th fastest Canadian 1500M runners for the past 20 years. Next look at the correlation between the number of runners with one of their best times run on Canadian soil.

Then argue for or against the need for more Canadian meets in order to improve depth. Can we have a strong national program without domestic meets? Are we better off sending all our emerging elites to Europe or hosting our own meets

I am not leading you with my questions...I am seriously curious.

[ottlcoach]

The Australia suggestion is a good one. I would suggest looking at a book entitled "Australian Sport - Better by design: The evolution of Australian Sport Policy by Stewart. That will give you a good idea as to the resources poured into Australian sport after 93 and even before.

[limestonemiler]

The general public doesn't care too much about competitive running. You'd have much more success writing your paper about dinosaurs.

[dr1500]

Dec 3, 2009 23:20:30 GMT -5 limestonemiler said:

The general public doesn't care too much about competitive running. You'd have much more success writing your paper about dinosaurs.

LOL, this guy kills me

[oldbones]

Sad but true .. t&f has a dreadful record of self promotion and relevance in society today; down from a high watermark about 20-30 years ago maybe?.

The "amateur mindset" still is pervasive in the sport where out of the box thinking is woefully lacking ... and this is really confusing cause I would state that runners/t&f are the "smartest of the athletes".

[jdome]

I think part of the problem surrounding the lack of "caring" from the general public is that from day 1 in elementary school, team sports like soccer, hockey, football and baseball are emphasized over individual ones, because of the pervasive thought amongst educators that team sports promote better "life skills" (whatever that means...) than individual ones. For example, when I think about my gym class experience from k-9, I can recall doing "fitness" (aka running usually, but sometimes aerobics, weights) for 1/2 weeks each year in elementary school (usually around the school track and field meet) and for about 1 week in gr 9. The rest of gym class was spent playing inane games that mostly involved rock paper scissors or something (no, seriously).

I feel that this is a major part of why no one cares about track. People who run track were the kids in gym class who sucked at all the "superior" sports. However, this attitude is not exactly limited to track, but to all individual sports. For example, at my high school, we have a very successful cross-country, tennis, badminton and wrestling programs. In the local paper, these sports get two sentences in some dark corner of the sports section, saying the results from OFSAA, which is obviously a stupid meet that is way less important than house league hockey or the 10 articles about how much our Jr. C hockey team sucks.

Ironically though, in later life (after university) it is running that wins. Why? Because you can do it on your own schedule. Because you are not limited by adult sports league options that may or may not be available in your community. Because it does not require equipment, money or 12135 hours of skill-based training. Because it allows people to develop at their own pace.

If educators are so worried about trying to promote "lifelong fitness", then why are they exposing kids (pretty much exclusively) to sports and activities that they are extremely unlikely to be able to do outside of gym class?

[benjamin]

Dec 5, 2009 12:31:29 GMT -5 jdome said:

I think part of the problem surrounding the lack of "caring" from the general public is that from day 1 in elementary school, team sports like soccer, hockey, football and baseball are emphasized over individual ones, because of the pervasive thought amongst educators that team sports promote better "life skills" (whatever that means...) than individual ones. For example, when I think about my gym class experience from k-9, I can recall doing "fitness" (aka running usually, but sometimes aerobics, weights) for 1/2 weeks each year in elementary school (usually around the school track and field meet) and for about 1 week in gr 9. The rest of gym class was spent playing inane games that mostly involved rock paper scissors or something (no, seriously).

I feel that this is a major part of why no one cares about track. People who run track were the kids in gym class who sucked at all the "superior" sports. However, this attitude is not exactly limited to track, but to all individual sports. For example, at my high school, we have a very successful cross-country, tennis, badminton and wrestling programs. In the local paper, these sports get two sentences in some dark corner of the sports section, saying the results from OFSAA, which is obviously a stupid meet that is way less important than house league hockey or the 10 articles about how much our Jr. C hockey team sucks.

This was not my experience at all. I never played hockey or football in elementary or high school, and soccer and baseball were a lot of fun and I still enjoy them.

I was first exposed to track and field in kindergarten. We had a school-wide event called Field Day. The younger children (up to grade 3) ran short races of 10 to 100 meters, did a ball throw, standing broad jump, and an obstacle course. Maybe a few other things. The funnest was the obstacle course.

Field Day for grades 4-8 was more typically track and field. The signup sheet went around the week before and you signed up for the events you wanted to participate in (I think 50, 100, 200, 400, 800, 1500, long jump, high jump, triple jump, ball throw, standing broad jump). I think it was a general requirement that you do three of the events, but could get an exemption with parental permission. If exempted you were required to help officiate the events instead, or run the water table, or whatever. The first seven or eight placers in each event got a colour-coded ribbon (I believe blue and red were first and second), and everyone else got a participation ribbon for trying.

I always signed up for every event (except high jump in later years because I sucked at it). The only one I didn't usually win was long jump, where I sometimes got 2nd.

Cross country started in grade 3 for me because the teachers thought I would enjoy it (normally grade 4) and everyone in the school from grade 4 and up was allowed to participate. Not everyone did, but we usually had two or three buses of kids go to the county regional meet (from a school of 120 kids), and the school shut down for the day because the teachers volunteered at the meet (our grade 8 teacher was in charge of it) and many of the parents did as well. Top five from there were selected for the county meet and got little trophies.

I didn't choose cross country and track because I was bad at everything else, either. I was pretty decent at everything else too. I just liked running more than I did the other sports. I played the other sports at recess. Running was what I did for fun on my own.

Field events were always a part of phys ed class during the spring. We learned how to high jump and long jump and triple jump. We rarely ran races during class, if ever. I don't remember doing so at least. But I still lived for phys ed class. It was what I looked forward to every day (5 days a week). The only time I hated it was when we had mandatory sex ed class instead, and when real sports were replaced with dance class or gymnastics. I resented them cutting into my gym time for that crap.

Our grade 8 teacher, I assume from a desire to have everyone out there being active and to help us do better at the cross country meet, set up a "run across Canada" activity. We made a huge map of Canada and put it on the wall where everyone could see it. Then we followed Terry Fox's route/planned route. Each day during the fall (may have been only 3 days per week? I don't remember if it was 3 or 5) the entire school spent 15 minutes at the end of the day running or walking in a loop around the yard (about 1/2km). You got a popsicle stick every time you passed the starting point. At the end of the 15 minutes you handed those in to your teacher, who tallied them up and added them to the overall total. I'm not sure if there was fundraising going on with the parents or not. I just remember running, and trying to run more than anyone else in the school.

I think you just need one teacher who's willing to get actively involved. Maybe things have changed, though it wasn't really that long ago. And who's to say having a teacher who really loves soccer and gets everyone out there playing soccer would be a bad thing? I don't think it would. Just get them out there doing something and having fun. The ones who want to run will run.

[jdome]

I'm not saying that kids weren't exposed to cross-country (at my elementary school, there made all kids gr 1 & up run xc, whether they wanted to or no), or that only kids who were bad at other sports did XC.
What I am saying is that there is an attitude in North America that seems to emphasize the value of team sports over individual ones, which leads kids who could be talented at running to choose other sports, and people to view running as a sport for people who are too unskilled to do "better" sports (whether this is true or not).
I don't think it is a negative idea to expose kids in school to things like soccer, basketball etc but I think that, especially in middle school/high school, that there could be more emphasis on exposing kids to activities that are more likely to be continued outside of school (not just running in this case - swimming, cycling, yoga, dance, strength training too). I mean, I spent 1 month on basketball and volleyball in gr 9 gym, and 1 week on fitness. I know this varies, depending on who taught you, but probably not that much because there is a curriculum to be followed.

Ironically, when I was kid/pre-teen there was nothing I hated more than running. I think this is partially because running IS awful if you only do it every once in a while and are expected to go "all-out" or something. I'm not saying that gym class should be distance running 101, but I think that having kids do a 5-10 min running warm-up before spending the rest of the class doing something else wouldn't be a bad idea.

PS. dance and gymnastics are real sports... though I admit that it is usually a waste of time to do these in gym class because unless you possess enough skill, you can't do anything that would be considered physically demanding.

[benjamin]

Dec 5, 2009 14:33:09 GMT -5 jdome said:

PS. dance and gymnastics are real sports... though I admit that it is usually a waste of time to do these in gym class because unless you possess enough skill, you can't do anything that would be considered physically demanding.

I'm not saying they're not real sports, but it was really pointless how it was carried out and at the time I definitely wouldn't have considered it proper activity for my phys ed class. Gymnastics involved us learning how to properly somersault. Dance classes involved learning how to square dance to what I can only describe as hoedown music. I'm sure there were other kids who enjoyed it.

As far as team sports go, cross country and track were treated as team sports for us. Everyone ran as an individual and it was clear we could accomplish something as individuals (like going on to the county meet, etc.), but it was the team competition that mattered. Each grade had scored team competition for trophies against the other schools, and there was an overall championship trophy that the winning school got their name engraved onto for the school with the most points from all divisions combined. We didn't usually win the overall, but they introduced a system that took into account school population so it was more fair and we usually won that.