Testing classical university first-year students' fitness for GTO complex tests

Фотографии: 

ˑ: 

PhD, Associate Professor S.E. Shivrinskaya
Cherepovets State University, Cherepovets

 

Keywords: physical culture, GTO Complex, physical fitness, students

Background. The reinstatement of the “Ready for Labour and Defence” GTO Complex with its health building ideas was initiated in response to the serious challenges in many social spheres, including the following: health deterioration trends in every age group (E.I. Ivanova, 2014; E.A. Mileta, V.N. Eliseeva, 2015; M.B. Petrova, 2016; A.A. Shabunova, G.V. Leonidova, O.N. Kalachikova, 2015; et al); low physical fitness of the young population including the enlistment age category (V.K. Ryumin, T.A. Danilenko, 2015; N.A. Solovyev, I.M. Manurov, N.V. Zinkova, N.A. Vershinina, 2016, S.Y. Tarasova, 2016, et al); alarming youth criminality levels (N.S. Grudin, D.V. Gryaznova, 2015; E.V. Demidova-Petrova, 2014; et al); and, the last but not least, problems in the national mass and elite sports (A.V. Kashina, E.B. Kalashnikova, 2016, E.L. Kornienko, S.V. Prutskov, 2015; V.P. Nogovitsyn, S.D. Khalyev, 2014, N.G. Sokolov, I.V. Putenko, 2014, et al). The situation has been further aggravated by the long-lasting suspension of research in the GTO Complex related matters that, as mentioned by V.A. Uvarov, has resulted in the loss of a lot of theoretical and practical information on the national physical fitness [3]. The Federal Law “On Physical Culture and Sports in the Russian Federation” reinstated the Russian “Ready for Labour and Defence” GTO Complex as a programmatic and regulatory basis for the national physical education system that sets due national physical fitness standards [4, article 2, item 2.1].

Pursuant to the Presidential Decree “On the Russian “Ready for Labour and Defence” GTO Complex” [2], the Government of the Russian Federation approved the GTO Complex Statute that sets forth the key objectives of the Complex including the national physical culture and sports sector efficiency advancement initiatives to improve the public health situation; facilitate personality development in the most harmonic and multisided manner; cultivate patriotism; and secure due succession in the public physical education sector [1]. The top-level decision-makers have taken efforts to support the initiative by the relevant financial, health, material, technical and staffing provisions to facilitate training for the GTO Complex tests. In this context a growing priority is given to the research projects to assess the student population fitness for the GTO Complex tests slated for implementation at national universities since 2017.

Objective of the study was to rate the current physical fitness of the full-time student population by the standard GTO Complex tests.

Methods and structure of the study. The study methods included a comprehensive analysis of the valid Federal legal and regulatory framework; educational experiment; physical fitness tests; and mathematical statistics tools for data processing. The study was performed in spring 2016 at Federal Cherepovets State University. Subject to the study were 352 first-year full-time students including 257 young women and 95 men aged 17-18 years. The subjects’ physical fitness was rated by the standard tests including 4 obligatory and one elective test and the relevant standard GTO Complex Class V and VI tests. It should be noted that in 2015-2016 Cherepovets State University accepted and included the latter standards in its academic physical fitness and progress rating toolkit applied in the academic Physical Education and Physical Education and Sports disciplines.  

Study results and discussion. The empirical data obtained in the study made it possible to rate the subjects’ specific motor abilities by the standard GTO Complex tests and the overall age-specific physical fitness by the relevant age classes of the GTO Complex tests: see Tables 1-3 hereunder.

Table 1. First-year male students’ physical fitness rated by the standard GTO Complex tests

Test

Gold Badge

Silver Badge

Bronze Badge

Failed

Qualified versus failed subjects, %

100m sprint

18

13

23

46

2km race

8

11

9

72

High bar pull-ups

24

37

12

27

Standing bends forward

12

22

31

35

Standing long jump

33

17

24

26

It should be noted that the 17-18 year-old men were most successful in the strength and speed-strength tests; plus more than 54% of the male subjects were successful in the flexibility and speed GTO Complex tests. However, 72% of the male subjects failed in the 2km race test that is indicative of their poor overall endurance level. Nevertheless, 28% to 74% of the male subjects were able to qualify for one or another GTO Badge in the relevant physical fitness tests. 

Table 2. First-year female students’ physical fitness rated by the standard GTO Complex tests

Test

Gold Badge

Silver Badge

Bronze Badge

Failed

Qualified versus failed subjects, %

100m sprint

26

10

13

51

2km race

6

13

6

75

Low bar pull-ups

76

9

9

6

Standing bends forward

34

34

15

27

Standing long jump

16

12

11

61

The female subjects showed wider gaps in the test results versus their male peers. Thus 91% of the females were successful in the standard strength tests with 76% being able to qualify for the GTO Gold Badge; albeit in the overall endurance 2km race test only 25% of the young women were able to qualify for one or another badge, and only 6% of them qualified for the GTO Gold Badge – that was the lowest percentage in the tests. Furthermore, above 70% of the young women were tested flexible enough to qualify for a badge, and 34% of them qualified for the GTO Gold Badge. However, more than a half of the female subjects failed in the standard speed and speed-strength tests.

A comparative analysis of the above test data versus the test data reported for some other national universities (I.V. Manzheley’s data for Tyumen State University, 2015; V.G. Korolyov and V.V. Bardushkin data for National Research University Moscow Institute of Electronic Technologies, 2016; et al) showed that the Cherepovets State University student population is no exclusion from the reported national physical fitness trends. Most of the analysts note in their reports the following: low endurance rates of the first-year students with 60% to 80% of them failing in the standard 2-3km race tests of the GTO Complex; good strength rates in male and female groups; and the high flexibility rates in the female group.

Table 3. Subjects’ gender-specific physical fitness rated by the standard age-specific GTO Complex tests

Test

Gold Badge

Silver Badge

Bronze Badge

Failed

Qualified versus failed subjects, %

Young men

6

8

8

76

Young women

6

9

6

79

Given in Table 3 are the empirical test data indicative of the overall gender-specific physical fitness of the CSU student population rated by the standard GTO Complex tests – that may be ranked as low. The data show some gender-specific differences, particularly the high strength and flexibility rates in the female group and high speed-strength rates in the male group; with both of the gender groups having particularly low rates in the overall endurance tests; and this finding urges the relevant adjustments to be made to the physical education policies and practices of the university.

Conclusion. The study data and analyses gave the ground to rank the students’ physical fitness low; and the finding supports the national research data on the poor physical fitness of the university student population in the country. The situation is largely due to the low overall endurance of the student population and, hence, the academic training system needs to give a special priority to the physical training methods focused on the aerobic energy supply sources for muscular activity. In this context efforts need to be taken to implement a variety of physical training practices including cross-country races, skiing, swimming, cycling, walking tours, Nordic and race walking, active team sports, different fitness disciplines, aerobics etc. A special emphasis should be made on regularity of these academic practices otherwise they may not be effective enough. Therefore, the academic physical education system needs to be reformed to complement the standard academic Physical Education discipline with a variety of physical training and sport group practices including the GTO group ones. 

References

  1. Postanovlenie Pravitelstva Rossiyskoy Federatsii ot 11.06.2014 g. # 540 [Russian Federation Government Resolution dated 11.06.2014, no 540]. Available at: https://rg.ru/2014/06/18/gto-dok.html (Accessed: 30.05.2016).
  2. Ukaz Prezidenta RF «O Vserossiyskom fizkulturno-sportivnom komplekse GTO» ot 24.03.2014 # 172 [Presidential Decree "On Russian physical culture and sports GTO complex dated 24.03.2014 № 172]. Available at: https://rg.ru/2014/03/26/gto-dok.html (Accessed: 25.05.2016).
  3. Uvarov V.A. Metodologiya nauchnogo obosnovaniya soderzhaniya vidov ispytaniy i normativnykh trebovaniy I-XI stupeney Vserossiyskogo fizkulturno-sportivnogo kompleksa «Gotov k trudu i oborone» [Methodology of scientific substantiation of the content of different tests and regulatory requirements of I-XI stages of Russian physical culture and sports complex "Ready for Labour and Defence]. Vestnik sportivnoy istorii, 2016. no. 1 (3), pp. 9-31.
  4. Federalny zakon ot 04.12.2007 # 329-FZ (red. ot 29.06.2015) «O fizicheskoy kulture i sporte v Rossiyskoy Federatsii [Federal Law 04.12.2007 No. 329-FL (ed. 06.29.2015) "On Physical Culture and Sports in the Russian Federation"]. Available at: http://www.gto.ru/files/docs/04_zakony/01_20130723_329.pdf (Accessed: 27.06.2016).

Corresponding author: sesh61@mail.ru

Abstract

In view of the modern social development challenges, the national government gives a top priority to the “Ready for Labour and Defence” GTO Complex test implementation at the national universities to improve the academic physical education system. One of important elements of the system is the students’ physical fitness rating standard GTO Complex tests with the relevant corrective actions to update the compulsory and extra-curricular physical education and sport practices; in addition, due conditions are to be established for the academic self-reliant body conditioning process and efforts need to be taken to step up the students’ motivations for physical self-perfection.

One of the study objectives was to rate gender-specific physical fitness of the full-time student population by the standard GTO Complex tests. We analysed the legal and regulatory provisions for the GTO Complex implementation in the national academic system, performed the students’ fitness tests and made a comparative analysis of the GTO Complex test rates for the classical university students. We analysed the actual students’ physical fitness rated by the GTO Complex standard test on a gender-specific basis; applied the empirical study data to find the most promising avenues for improvement of the academic Physical Education discipline; and offered the off-class sporting, physical culture and health program for the self-reliant academic physical training process.