Dear Mister/Miss Secretary of Education
It has been a hot debate around town that some schools are taking PE lessons out of the curriculum in the name of enabling students to concentrate more on academic subjects. As a Form Six student, I strongly believe that this practice is harmful to the students and society as a whole and it should be dealt with at once.
To begin with, the emphasis on academic performance is already strong enough in Hong Kong and it is not sensible to use academic results as reasons for cutting PE lessons. Hong Kong students, being raised in one of the most competitive cities in the world, have always been the most hardworking and tough ones all around the globe. Many are having only six hours of sleep a day in order to strive for the ridiculously small number of places in universities. The situation is bad enough already. In Germany, for instance, 80% of the students can get a place in university, not having to sacrifice sleep each and every night. This is a completely different scenario. Yet the country produces the best scientists and researchers. Is our society ready to worsen the situation in Hong Kong and increase the burden on the shoulders of the students? Do we really believe that increasing the stress can squeeze more out of our children?
PE lessons are very important to the students and can be one of the greatest events of a week. They are the time to relax. It is not uncommon for students to become sick of the mundane school life, and PE lessons come into play as a break from both mental and physical boredom. Students let go of the books; all they have got to do is to play a match. This temporary switch from academic brain work to physical movements can help relieve stress and increase efficiency. Plus, the teamwork and interpersonal skills developed through playing sports are beneficial to students. After all, a good education system should be comprehensive, not focusing merely on academic studies, but also on mental and physical well-being.
As PE lessons are part and parcel of the education system, scrapping them might have an impact on the students’ development of a healthy lifestyle. I am not saying that PE lessons can provide sufficient exercise for the students, but they do promote healthy living. On the contrary, removing PE lessons from the curriculum might send a wrong message to the students that they do not need regular exercise to stay healthy, or that getting good academic results in exams alone means “success”. This is a lose-lose situation, as in the long run, the city needs to pay for higher medical costs, an earlier retired workforce or even shortened lifespans of citizens.
To conclude, I sincerely hope that the government can halt this trend for the sake of the city’s future, perhaps by introducing a compulsory physical education curriculum, by reducing the examination pressure of students and schools, or by promoting regular exercise in town.
Yours faithfully,
Chris Wong