Posted on 10/20/2004 10:04:43 AM PDT by Willie Green
For education and discussion only. Not for commercial use.
The University Faculty Senate will discuss whether Penn State should continue to mandate the Health and Physical Activity (GHA) requirement at its meeting next Tuesday in Harrisburg.
Currently, students must take three GHA credits to graduate.
Dawn Blasko, Senate secretary, said this week's Senate report reviews the GHA requirement, benchmarking Penn State with other Big Ten and state universities.
According to the report, studies show most other schools do not require students to take health and physical education courses.
Blasko said the Senate Committee on Undergraduate Education, which formed the report, did not make any recommendations about the requirement, but has opened up the issue to the university for discussion.
"We're almost alone in this requirement," Senate chair Kim Steiner said during a discussion at the Undergraduate Student Government (USG) Academic Assembly meeting Monday. "Some people may want this to disappear."
Penn State spokesman Tysen Kendig said the university often compares itself with other respected institutions to evaluate its curricula and policies.
"We have to ask ourselves why Big Ten schools don't have [the requirement]," he said.
Kendig added that taking away the requirement is only an idea at this stage.
"It's too preliminary to get into," he said. "It will have to be studied over the next few months or even years."
Assembly President Mark Levin said the assembly has not provided a position on whether the requirement should remain in place, but has considered the possibility.
"I think that it's something that's going to be considered in the future," he said.
Some fitness educators said they believe the requirement is an essential component to a student's schedule.
"There are students from this university who would not take it if it were not required," said Clarence Stoner, a kinesiology professor. "It can open up a whole new world to fitness and life-long activities."
Kinesiology instructor Jim Sullivan agreed with Stoner and added that he also feels the requirement is important.
"If it's totally open to student preferences, they may not take requirements," he said, adding that students should have multiple options on what courses to schedule.
"Within those requirements there should be some flexibility," he said.
Student expressed different ideas about whether the requirement is necessary based on their personal experiences.
Kristy Owens (senior-commercial recreation management) said the requirement should be instituted at Penn State.
She said she recently earned a two-year associate's degree in physical education and recognizes the importance of fitness.
"If you take it away, it may make people more sedentary," she said.
Owens added that our society does not give students many options for physical activity.
"It may make things worse for the whole population of the school," she said.
However, Megan Kohut (sophomore-engineering) provided a different view.
"It's OK to take it away," she said. "None of my friends at other schools have to take it."
However, Kohut did say she enjoys the fitness classes she scheduled, including karate and scuba diving. "It breaks up the schedule," she said.
When I first arrived on PSU campus (34 years ago), all incoming freshman were required to take a "fitness test" (a mile run < 7 minutes; swim 3~4 laps of the pool, tread water 2~3 minutes or something like that) to determine if some kind of basic skills course was necessary. Satisfying that requirement, we could choose from a wide variety of Exercise And Sport Activities to satisfy this requirement.
As a conservative alumnus, I favor retaining the fitness requirement under the "healthy body, healthy mind" theory of education. I also oppose dropping the requirement in light of the politically correct trend of imposing "socially relevant" liberal indoctrination courses instead.
Good grief, if you drop Phys Ed, all the students are gonna graduate lookin' like Michael Moore!
Gotta get 'em up off their web-surfin' couch-potato lard butts and make 'em do a little excercise!
WTF!
I don't remember the mile-run, but I do remember the swim test & drown-proofing (1977).
It may have been 6 minutes instead of 7.
We did it on the indoor track at Rec Hall where 7 laps = 1 mile.
Yup, I had to take the "swim test" as well.
Don't worry, they'll replace these credits with mandatory credits in Womyn's and Black Studies with a little LBGSA studies thrown in for those so inclined.
I think they have mandatory "diversity requirement" credits now, don't they?
yes, they do have mandatory diversity classes. 95 to 99'. I watched a good school get taken over by the PC fascists.
Trouble is, most college phys ed requirements are not about fitness, but about employment opportunities for the instructors. My alma mater still has the same phys ed requirement that it had when I was a student 20 years ago: 4 semesters worth of twice of week classes from a wide choice of activities. Students who don't want to exert themselves have no trouble steering themselves towards stuff like archery, or "social dancing" or "folk dancing" which involves a lot of standing around listening to explanations of the steps and floor patterns, organizing people into pairs or groups, and a few minutes of feigned effort to perform the dances.
If they want healthy bodies they know where to get them. Three credits in four or five years of college isn't going slim down a junior Michael Moore. The students don't need this type of nannyism (but then I could say that and more about the politically correct indoctrination classes).
"so they teachers need to"???
Good grief.
Yep. That's where I learned to hit a golf ball.
(Not that I was ever any good at it.)
But people need to understand that this ISN'T just a typical high-school level gym requirement.
Sure, there are some basic fitness courses for those who are in desperate need.
And I'm sure they also make accomodations and/or exemptions for those students who are physically challenged or incapable.
But it is NOT a rigorously demanding requirement.
Quite the opposite, it gives students an exposure and opportunity to develop skills in lifetime activities that will add "balance" to their lives.
SD
I'm trying to remember the world class fly fisherman that used to teach there. Getting into one of his "casting classes" was not easy.
I remember seeing the students casting into buckets on the floor of Rec Hall.
Something for everybody, I have no problems with that.
The Good Lord didn't create everybody with the phsysiques of professional or Olympic athletes.
If these alternative activities help students get off their butts and do SOMETHING that's even remotely physically active, their lives will be better for it.
I'd also like to throw out an experience that I had with the Penn State Phys Ed system. We had a flag football class. With 1 week to go in the term (we were on tri-mesters then) the instructor asks if there were any pre-Med students in the class, "who needed an 'A' to keep their GPA up." He asked these students to meet with him -- presumably to jigger their grades upward. Can't say that I had much respect for my school after that incident.
Of course, I was still disgusted that I had to take Phys Ed in the first place. Having played 3 varsity sports in High School you'd think that they'd let you place out of the requirement the way they allow Honors students to place out of other Freshman requirements.
"All work and no play makes Jack a dull boy."
Ya gotta learn to juggle your schedule to make time for other interests and activities.
Physical fitness helps balance your life and prevents mental "burnout".
It would be a better use of students time, not to mention college resources, to have them all spend 5 minutes doing push-ups and jumping jacks couple of times a week, than to spend an hour lounging around in an archery class. This could be accomplished at the beginning of, say, English class.
We just used alcohol for that. ;-)
SD
That's what they did with the running and swimming tests.
You should've passed those without even breaking a sweat, just like I did. That's what opened up all the other options to you, without having to do push-ups, sit-ups, jumping jacks and jog or take basic swimming lessons for a full semester.
So much for Underway Basket Weaving we took to Millersville State in Millersville, PA.
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