 CHAPTER 70--STRENGTHENING AND IMPROVEMENT OF ELEMENTARY AND SECONDARY 
                                 SCHOOLS
 
             SUBCHAPTER X--PROGRAMS OF NATIONAL SIGNIFICANCE
 
                 Part L--Physical Education for Progress
 
Sec. 8352. Findings

    Congress makes the following findings:
        (1) Physical education is essential to the development of 
    growing children.
        (2) Physical education helps improve the overall health of 
    children by improving their cardiovascular endurance, muscular 
    strength and power, and flexibility, and by enhancing weight 
    regulation, bone development, posture, skillful moving, active 
    lifestyle habits, and constructive use of leisure time.
        (3) Physical education helps improve the self esteem, 
    interpersonal relationships, responsible behavior, and independence 
    of children.
        (4) Children who participate in high quality daily physical 
    education programs tend to be more healthy and physically fit.
        (5) The percentage of young people who are overweight has more 
    than doubled in the 30 years preceding 1999.
        (6) Low levels of activity contribute to the high prevalence of 
    obesity among children in the United States.
        (7) Obesity related diseases cost the United States economy more 
    than $100,000,000,000 every year.
        (8) Inactivity and poor diet cause at least 300,000 deaths a 
    year in the United States.
        (9) Physically fit adults have significantly reduced risk 
    factors for heart attacks and stroke.
        (10) Children are not as active as they should be and fewer than 
    one in four children get 20 minutes of vigorous activity every day 
    of the week.
        (11) The Surgeon General's 1996 Report on Physical Activity and 
    Health, and the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, 
    recommend daily physical education for all students in kindergarten 
    through grade 12.
        (12) Twelve years after Congress passed House Concurrent 
    Resolution 97, 100th Congress, agreed to December 11, 1987, 
    encouraging State and local governments and local educational 
    agencies to provide high quality daily physical education programs 
    for all children in kindergarten through grade 12, little progress 
    has been made.
        (13) Every student in our Nation's schools, from kindergarten 
    through grade 12, should have the opportunity to participate in 
    quality physical education. It is the unique role of quality 
    physical education programs to develop the health-related fitness, 
    physical competence, and cognitive understanding about physical 
    activity for all students so that the students can adopt healthy and 
    physically active lifestyles.

(Pub. L. 89-10, title X, Sec. 10999C, as added Pub. L. 106-554, 
Sec. 1(a)(1) [title VII, Sec. 701], Dec. 21, 2000, 114 Stat. 2763, 
2763A-77.)

                       References in Text

    House Concurrent Resolution 97, 100th Congress, referred to in par. 
(12), is H. Con. Res. 97, Dec. 12, 1987, 101 Stat. 2014, which is not 
classified to the Code.
