Our physical education (PE) and athletics program focuses on the whole person - body and mind - and emphasizes participation, cooperation and teamwork. The core PE curriculum offers a program that includes dance, music, free expression, balance and agility. Starting in kindergarten, students are introduced to soccer, floor hockey, basketball, track and field, volleyball, badminton and lacrosse.

Jim Flanigan and Celia Richard, our physical education teachers, conduct our PE program primarily in the large, modern gymnasium facilities at the Columbia Park Boys & Girls Club. In preschool, children have the opportunity to have fun doing PE in the schoolyard three days a week. In elementary school, students have PE twice a week at the Boys & Girls Club, and in middle school they have PE three times a week.

Using positive reinforcement, our PE teachers help our students expand their movement skills and develop the self-confidence to participate in multiple forms of physical activity. They are taught to value the intrinsic reward of doing their best. As they mature and begin to participate in competitive activities, students develop an understanding of competition as optimizing individual strengths and skills in a positive, meaningful way.

Middle school students (grades 5-8) may participate in our after school athletics program that currently includes co-ed volleyball, co-ed cross country, girls and boys basketball and co-ed futsol (indoor soccer). The commitment of the students to the sports program is two days per week (two practices and/or one practice and one game a week). CDS students compete in the San Francisco Independent School Athletic League. Our teams use the CDS schoolyard for practice and the gymnasium at the nearby Columbia Park Boys & Girls Club for home games.