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part by any accompanying assistance or incentives and by whether means 
of enforcement are in place. In other words, guidelines, laws, and policies 

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Copyright © National Academy of Sciences. All rights reserved.
Educating the Student Body: Taking Physical Activity and Physical Education to School
26
 
Educating the Student Body
are more likely to be properly implemented if there are aids and rewards 
(e.g., funding, training) for doing so and penalties (e.g., less funding, less job 
security) for not doing so. The varying strengths of influence are depicted 
in Figure 1-3 by the varying thicknesses of the arrows exiting each level of 
influence (i.e., federal, state, district, school, classroom). Figure 1-3 also 
acknowledges other influences, such as other and sometimes competing 
policies issuing from the same organizational level; competing interests; or a 
lack of funding, personnel, or space. The arrows veering toward the empty 
space at the edges of Figure 1-3 indicate that at every level there is likely to 
be slippage. One study found, for example, that seven of eight high schools 
in Mississippi and Tennessee had entirely avoided implementation of new 
state legislation designed to increase levels of physical activity and improve 
the quality of physical education in high schools. The main barriers to imple-
mentation at these schools were the priority given to standardized testing, 
subordination of physical education to varsity sports, resource constraints, 
and policy overload (Amis et al., 2012).
Figure 1-3 also suggests that monitoring (surveillance) of federal guide-
lines, state laws, district policies, and school and classroom policies, plus 
related incentives and enforcements, is important. Monitoring of students’ 
physical activity opportunities and experiences is essential because they rep-
resent the ultimate outcome of importance, and barriers may have derailed 
implementation (Amis et al., 2012).
A systems approach demands analysis of existing and potential prac-
tical program and policy interactions among the sectors and individuals 
outlined above, interactions that are necessary for the optimal impact on 
physical activity. A process of aligning priorities among disparate sectors 
should lead to new types of intersectoral interactions. These new interac-
tions can potentially produce greater synergistic effects than independent 
within-sector efforts. Such synergies can in turn allow for opportunities to 
pool and share resources. For example, synergies that lead to combining 
efforts in the education and transportation sectors may be more likely to 
create a sustainable and effective program that promotes active transporta-
tion to and from school than such a program implemented only within the 
education sector. Developing these approaches in a place-based framework 
will allow for tailoring interventions, taking into account the strengths and 
constraints, cultural and demographic characteristics, and resources of each 
local context. The outcomes achieved must be sustainable (persistence of 
changes made and ongoing adoption of new ones) and scalable (diffusion 
across settings) and have reach across population subgroups.

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Copyright © National Academy of Sciences. All rights reserved.
Educating the Student Body: Taking Physical Activity and Physical Education to School
Introduction
 
27