to think allowing our sons to play rugby is irresponsible parenting?

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There's another article in the Times today about Professor Allyson Pollock's attempt to get people to understand how dangerous school rugby is. She's been abused on Twitter, stonewalled by other parents, ignored by Rugby's professional bodies. (Link here but behind paywall)

Basically, a combination of parental peer pressure and the Establishment mean people won't listen to what she has to say. Rugby as it is played at school at present is not safe.

AIBU to think we aren't protecting our sons? Why are we allowing this compulsory sport to put at risk so much for our boys?

There might be a risk in everything that we do

Yes - but unlike adults, children often have no choice to undertake these activities.

Is that fair?

www.rugby.com.au/Portals/18/Files/Coaching/ARU_RUISS_Presentation_2013.pdf
I ride a horse, I really don't have a leg to stand on trying to tell my Rugby mad DS he cant play because it is dangerous. I guess I am a doubly irresponsible parent.

More importantly, because of the lower weight/speed the risks to injury

You've not played against some of the women I have

tweenage

Exactly. If a child wants to do something, fine. If they don't want to do such a sport which is risky, that should be fine also.

It's the compulsory aspect which is the issue here, why are so many people ignoring that?

Round my grandma's way we see the mountain rescue helicopter around once per week in the summer
I still love mountaineering though, and my first proper excursion was aged 14 with my dad.

I don't think my mountain dwelling cousins did mountaineering for PE but I'm pretty sure towards the end of primary school skiing was one of their winter PE sports (I was SO jealous!).

Ok, I do agree rugby shouldn't be compulsory.

So what would you make compulsory? My rugby loving DS loathes cross country, but somehow it's OK to force him to do that?

I do not have access to many of the articles/papers/books that the OP has linked to, however I was interested in the abstract to one of the links:

overall incidence of injury of 81 per 1000 (adult) player hours, three times that of child and adolescent players (26.7 per 1000 player hours). So adult players can expect to be injured once every 9.3 matches on average, assuming that each match is 80 minutes long.

Using the statistics as simplistically a it seems this paper does, this would imply that child/adolescent players can be expected to be 'injured' once every 28 games.

That is probably less than one per season.

I think an injury is defined as something that prevents you playing for a week, so not necessarily that serious

But Stealthsquiggle there is a much higher likelihood of serious injury from rugby than cross country, that's the whole point. It's not about children only doing sports they liked, though in a well resourced system that would be the ideal.

I think there is a difference between not doing something because you loathe it and not doing something because it has risks attached that you think are too dangerous for you.

It would set an interesting precedent if you could opt out of a school subject because you loathed it

Peachy because sports have to be compulsory in schools, for several reasons, including but not limited to the essential points of staff availability and exposing children to different sports so they then can choose later based on knowledge. All the PE staff i know, and all the rugby coaches i know keep their knowledge and training up to date. to most it is a matter of pride that they will surrender their free time to be coached in how to improve their coaching.
All sports carry an element of risk, football which has been cited here many times as a better choice carries a high risk of injury to the lower limbs, I know of many a child concussed or with facial injuries from hockey balls.
The lifetime dangers to a persons health from not taking part in any form of physical activity are well researched and documented.
Offering rugby in schools, along with a balanced programme of other sports allows kids to find a sport they enjoy, and then choose to continue with later on.
To those who cite a couple of medics on here who will not allow their children to play rugby, i can offer the counter anecdotal evidence of literally 100s of medics i know, or know of who either play, or permit/encourage their dc to play, including orthopaedic surgeons, neurosurgeons, sports medicine specialists.
The author of the original article has a particular axe to grind. Her unfortunate experience does not turn her into an expert on the matter of sports and safety, nor clearly on the interpretation of data!

My 9 year old DS plays rugby for our local team. The coaches and support staff are nothing short of amazing, and very on the ball when it comes to tackles (they've just moved from tag to contact, so this season was a bit of a baptism of fire).

His school have it on their curriculum for PE and he played it at school in September and October last year. Bearing in mind his love of the game and his general sensible attitude towards it, every time they played he came home with news that someone had received a black eye, a cut to the face, a broken nose, mild concussion, and eventually I phoned the Head and requested he take it off the PE rota. DS is sporty and does judo, rugby, swimming, horse riding and cricket, so isn't a delicate flower but from the very little I've seen of doing rugby at school, it's not safe enough to warrant being compulsory. Adding it as an extra-curricular after school club run by a trained professional seems like the best middle ground.

rosie

Do you think children at a school which offers rugby should be forced to play it?

The lifetime dangers to a persons health from not taking part in any form of physical activity are well researched and documented

FFS - people know that. It's not a case of doing rugby or nothing.

There are loads of sports out there. All those people who are saying it's character building, good for you, keeps you fit etc People know that - and it's fantastic that they and their children do it.

No one wants to stop children doing a sport they enjoy. No one wants to see it banned.

But I don't think it should be compulsory. That does not mean you are condemning them to a life of physical inactivity.

Parents can make their own risk assessment with regards to their children and allow them to play rugby after school. But forcing children to participate in a relatively high risk sport is irresponsible. I can't see a benefit of playing rugby that outweighs inflicting the risks on children who have no choice.

I live in a city which hosts the rugby world cup this year, and I'm watching with dread (and disbelief) how officials here are promoting rugby participation of children especially, as part of the "legacy efforts".

Yes orlando, not for ever, but i do think all children should be exposed to a variety of different sports on a compulsory basis. Otherwise kids will opt out of something they may potentially really enjoy based on the odd comment from their brother/mum/aunty and i think that would not only be a massive shame but could repercussions for the lifetime health if they do not enjoy the very sports they opt for, and so end up as inactive older teenagers and adults.
My DC attend/have attended a school where rugby is compulsory, but the PE staff only make this the case for the first couple of years, after that non rugby team members get a choice, or usually 2 choices of sports during the main games session. Many schools do similar, compulsory in years 7/8 on a sports rotation, optional thereafter.
Quite often for many sports dc do not enjoy the first session or two because they do not understand the rules/procedures. I would maintain they must try it in order to then be able to make an informed choice later on.

YABU and so is she.

Doctors are just as fallible at assessing risk as any other person

www.bbc.com/news/magazine-28166019

If you seriously want to stop a child doing something that puts them at risk - make every child in the country walk to school instead of going in cars. As it is convenient to drive your child to school, that is never going to happen.

This reminds me of the effect on deaths and injuries that people's aversion to flying after 9/11 had. People switched to travelling by road and rail which (even taking into account 9/11) are much riskier!

We just are not programmed to understand risk in a logical way - it gets tied up with personal experience and anecdotes

Rosieposy4 I'm in no way suggesting that sport/PE shouldn't be compulsory. I just said that in an ideal world there'd be a range of options to choose from. Even if there isn't a broad range of options to choose from though I don't think children should be compelled to take part in rugby though because of the higher relative risk of injury.

I support Rosie's post

Orlando
I never said it was rugby or nothing. The beauty of sports lies not least in the variety. For every child who loves football there will be another that hates it, ditto rugby, golf, mountaineering, swimming you name it. Schools have a responsibility within the PE curriculum to ensure children are exposed to a wide variety of sports, hopefully then they can decide on one or two that will turn into their passions.
For some children rugby will be this sport, they may well be the kids who hate football and hockey with a passion, being not good enough at speed or ball and foot coordination. For others they will hate rugby but love something else.

I think if rugby is compulsory at school it should be one of the lower-contact versions - "rippa rugby" at primary school, touch at senior. Children who want to play the full contact version can do it through clubs.

Isn't the whole point of PE getting kids to be active since that is good for their health and wellbeing? And not to accumulate injuries?

It is not the school's role to promote high risk sports. They should encourage children to find an activity that they enjoy and is relatively safe for the child to do.

Btw I have a sports injury from 18 years ago (skiing, on holiday) that required two operations, and I am still in pain regularly and have limited mobility in the knee as a result. I'm not blaming anyone for it (my choice to go skiing, and I'm still a skier today) but people should not forget that sports injuries can be serious and limit what a person can do later in life.

DS now plays both codes but leaugue has been full contact from 6 years old.
His main ambition in life isto play in the NRL. We've been to hundreds of leaugue matches, and now a few kick n clap games too. Whole family has season tickets for our local super leaugue team.Injuries have been few and far between, but of course there are always risks.

In short he/we loveit

He's in yr 7 at a regular comprehensve school where it is NON compulsory. I am really shocked that it is compulsory in this day and age tbh. At my school years ago it was, but that was a public school and loads of things wrere forced on pupils back then that wouldn't be now

In dc's school the boys get to choose weather to participate in both rugby & football. There are other options always. Girls are not forced to play hockey either and dd never has done.

Do schools really make it compulsory to tackle, ruck & scrum etc? Or are they just training without the contact in PE lessons?

But back in the real world, schools have limited resources and cannot offer an infinite range of sports. Even if they could do them one at a time, that would mean keeping staff trained on lots more sports, and unless every school did the same sports at the same time would mean no matches against other schools, which loses a whole load of learning opportunities. Also, unless it's an enormous school fragmenting the sports might mean not having a large enough group for team sports.

My DC do rugby/hockey/football/netball/cricket/rounders/athletics/cross country. No one gets to choose.