The concept of using schools to change society is not new.

"To reform mankind, we have been advised to begin not with adults, but with children; we must begin with the schools."
- Luther Halsey Gulick, November 10, 1910, The American School Board Journal, V.41, "The Schools as a Medium for the Promotion of Health", an article in support of teaching hygiene in the public schools to fight disease.

The idea of the mind-body connection being an important element in sports and in our lives was important to the first Physical Activity Director for the City of New York as far back as 1894 when he held the position of Director the YMCA Training School (now Springfield College).

"The modern psychology is all in the line of showing that body and mind are not two separate and individual essences, but that each is so wedded to the other that is impossible for us to see where one begins or the other ends, or for us to trace anything which affecting the one, doesn't also affect the other."
- Luther Halsey Gulick, January 18, 1894, Young Men's Era, V. 84, p.401, "What the Triangle Means", an article about his design of the YMCA inverted triangle logo to include the words, "Mind, Body and Spirit".

The purpose of athletics in schools was clear to the man who should be considered the Father of Interscholastic Sports.

"These group activities involve not involve not merely the subordination of self, and the elevation of the group, but…. involve obedience to a leader, even when he is evidently mistaken; involve self-control, loyalty to the group as a whole."
- Luther Halsey Gulick, March, 1899, The Pedagogical Seminary, V. 6, pp. 135-51, "Psychological, pedagogical, and Religious Aspects of Group Games".

"It is the function of school athletics, when rightly conducted, to convert this gang instinct from evil to righteousness; to make its product social righteousness, rather social unrighteousness; to convert into terms of actual living, intense interests and activities."
- Luther Halsey Gulick, November 1906, The School Review, V.13, pp. 677-678, "Team Games and Civic Loyalty".

Dr. Gulick, one of the Founders of the Boys Scouts and sole founder of the Camp Fire Girls, knew that to teach character, we couldn't just talk about it with children, but we must have them live it daily. Preaching ethicsat kids does not teach sportsmanship. Character must be practiced everyday with their coach, like any sport-specific physical skill until it becomes one of our traits.

"We apparently still think that we can develop the power of self-control without giving people freedom, that we can develop ethical power by merely talking about it, sermonizing about it…Hence the significance of having…. athletic organizations…. where honesty is recognized and fair play is generally accorded. Anti-ethical play is worse than no play at all."
- Luther Halsey Gulick, Charities and the Commons, August 3, 1907, V. 18, pp. 481-86, "Play and Democracy".

Dr. Gulick, pioneer in athletics at the YMCA and in the schools understood the power of schools and what they could deliver for society's greater good.

"The questions must turn upon the effects of this playing upon the moral character. Athletics are important, it seems to me, not as athletics, but because of this social effect…here is a powerful social force. It may work toward a higher social morality or toward a lower one…The point of view I wish to present here is…. that it is possible to develop the idea of corporate or inter-institutional morality."
- Luther Halsey Gulick, February 1908, American Physical Education Review, V.13, pp. 98-104, "Amateurism".

Have we fulfilled the vision of Dr. Gulick? Now we have a one hundred year science that not only studies how to think to be successful, but encourages hard work and helping others. The time is ripe to make his vision a reality.