From Education Week:

Viviana Nicastro, a senior at Saratoga Springs High School in New York, said her physical education classes before the pandemic often were an exercise in doing as little as possible while people were watching.

“Not a lot of people would try in gym,” she said. “There wasn’t a lot of encouragement. There were a select few people who really knew how to do one sport, and then the rest were kind of discarded a little bit—not in the respect of the teacher per se, but [by] the students as a whole.”

This year, Nicastro participates in a unified P.E. class, structured to include both general education students and those with intellectual disabilities. While Nicastro is in general education, she said the difference in structure and tone has been important for her in engaging in class.

“In unified P.E. right now, I think that all of the activities are a test of your ability, but also like a learning experience for everyone,” she said. “So you’re helping other people while you’re learning, you’re doing it together, and everyone is more involved. Everyone is lifting each other up.”

In its first survey of high school sports participation since the pandemic, the National Federation of State High School Associations found that the number of students participating in unified sports programs has risen nearly tenfold, from about 5,500 in the 2018-19 school year to nearly 48,000 in 2021-22. Twenty states now have districts with unified physical education programs or varsity teams, double the number of states with unified programs pre-pandemic.

Read more from Edweek.org.