should this be here or in the news section?
*Please read this or at least skimm it*
I do A level PE (don't laugh!) and for the A2 part of the course the school gave us the option of being assessed on the sport of our choice in place of the research project we had to do last year, and to my delight this includes climbing!
My PE teacher read out the criteria we were going to be assessed by for everybody's own individual sports. Hockey includes tests of: fitness and recovery, specific skills (reverse stick shot etc.), and match performance. As does football. And swimming includes time trails, and technical assessment as well as fitness tests.
What was climbing going to include? Climb F7b+? E5? V9?
NO! The criteria assesses: rope coiling skills, the ability to set up about 20 types of anchor, hold a leader fall, CARE FOR YOUR ENVIROMENT (!), THE HISTORY OF ROCK CLIMBING (!), SETTING UP (AND USING) TOP ROPES, ABSAILING, PUTING ON A HARNESS.... The other confounding thing is that you have to have completed a 12 week personal exercise plan in preparation (not a problem as designing and completing this is a coursework), and yet they don't test you physically at all! The nearest they come to doing so is the (small) "use various techniques to overcome climbs of varying difficulty" section.
Who set these criteria! Some rambler / bumbley from cocktalk who happened to read a neil greshem article on the bog?! There is no other explanation other than that this person is completely unaware of the change in the world-climbing scene over the last 15-20 years! Its nothing to do with the BMC's don't '...actively promote climbing' policy designed to preserve crags and access issues, because this IS actively promoting climbing, and on real rock, and some criteria requires you to top rope and abseil! It's certainly not a safety/liability issue (ha)!
I'm not going to stand for it I'm afraid, I live in London, I cant drive, and when I actually can get to some good rock I'm not going to waste my time faffing around setting up belays and stuff when I could be bouldering/ sport climbing/ DWSing or anything really. So Id have to make journey up to sheff to practice this shit and not climb, while being scowled at (and 'politely' informed) for setting up abseils and top ropes everywhere! At a time when I have lots of revision, coursework, and I have to choose which uni and which course to do, and apply.
PLEASE RESPOND! I will be contacting the exam board! Even if its just 'yeh that's shit', or even better if you have something to add! I will be using useful posts to back me up! This will help not just me but also future PE students, AND IT WILL HELP TO SOME DEGREE REDUCE THE PERCEPTION THAT US CLIMBERS JUST WALK UP HILLS AND HAVE ACCIDENTS!
cheers, trev
