One of the many new classes being offered for the 2025-2026 school year will introduce a new way to earn a P.E. credit. This class, called Outdoor Recreation, will focus on enjoying and experiencing the outdoors in a way that encourages physical growth and develops an increased appreciation of nature. As well as this, the divergent P.E. class should allow for learning opportunities that give students knowledge to help them in pursuing outdoor related activities. 

Courtland Ingram, physical education teacher, created this class for those who want something different than the currently offered P.E. credits.

 “Power Walking is good for some kids, strength and conditioning is good for other kids, but it’s not good for everybody,” said Ingram. “We want to find and have a spectrum of classes offered in the P.E. department that all kids can be interested in. Because if you are interested in something, it’s easier to be there and be engaged.”

As for the specific offered activities, Ingram would like to tailor them based on the season; using winter equipment for example.

 “When I grew up, cross country skiing was what we did at our middle school, and I lived in Missouri,” said Ingram. “And If it’s snowing, snowshoeing would be great. So we could find a way to get some snowshoes that are available and practice snowshoeing.”

Being the first year, the 2025 class will scale in time and activities available based on the amount of students enrolled. As well as this, the first year will act as a trial run, to help build a class the students want.

“It’s not going to be perfect the first year,” said Ingram. “We are going to learn and continue to grow every year.”

Ingram does have a list of things that he does want to include in the class, or might try in the future.

“Things that we will definitely have is hunter’s education, we might do boating licensing, we’ll do fishing, I would like to teach camping, orienteering, hiking, maybe even trail building. I would also like to do tree identification, or even things like finding what’s edible in the wildlife,” said Ingram.

Because of the variety of things that could be offered, and the possible limit to what can all be done, Ingram would like to offer the choices to the students.

“So if we have ten things we could do, but only have enough time for five of them, we could maybe ask the class,” said Ingram.