Undergraduate professional preparation programs in health promotion/wellness in the southern United States.

Abstract

The purpose of this study was to examine the current status of undergraduate professional programs in health promotion/wellness throughout the Southern district of the American Alliance of Health, Physical Education, Recreation, and Dance. There were 386 departments of physical education surveyed in the Southern United States, 276 of which responded. Of the respondents, forty-five departments of physical education indicated they offered alternative career tracks in health promotion/wellness. These forty-five programs of study were the primary focus of this investigation. A survey instrument was constructed for the purpose of collecting descriptive data about the number of programs in health promotion/wellness available at the undergraduate level, to determine the types of core courses required for graduation, to investigate which organization or operational model most frequently influenced curriculum design, to determine where these were most frequently housed, and to explore trends in core curriculum offerings. It was discovered that most departments of physical education in the study population had no standards in core curriculum design when offering the major. The majority of the study population reported that fewer than five courses were changed from the traditional teacher education program in order to offer the major. Also, relatively few in the study population (36 percent) indicated they had hired additional teaching staff in order to offer the major. The majority of respondents (59 percent) indicated they were currently dissatisfied with their existing curriculum and reported they were divided (50 percent) in their intention to revise existing curriculum. The respondents reported over ten different sources from which they would obtain literature regarding undergraduate curricular standards in health promotion/wellness. The majority of the respondents indicated they were aware of the National Association for Sport and Physical Education Task Force's standard