Engineering Students Opinion On Pe 603100 Sports And Health: An Introductory Physical Education Course At The Hashemite University In Jordan

In general, engineering curricula at most of the universities in the world do not require students to take Physical Education courses. There are a few exceptions, as some universities require such courses. Several engineering departments accept such courses to fill social, humanity and art requirements. This is despite the strong link between physical fitness and mental preparedness. It is acceptable to state that physical activities increase the learning capacity of all students including those in the engineering fields. The Department of Physical Education and Sports Science at the Hashemite University in Zarqa, the Hashemite Kingdom of Jordan offers various courses on physical education. The engineering departments at this university do not require their students to take physical education courses. Nonetheless, many engineering students take physical courses. Up to one third of the students are from engineering majors in introductory physical education courses. This seems to be a strong indication that physical courses are perceived well by engineering students. Qualitative statements like this need to be supported by quantitative assessments. Such assessments can then be used to decide the appropriate policies by various engineering departments on the inclusion or exclusion of physical education in their curricula. This paper at hand is on this specific topic. The PE 603100 course of: Sports and Health is offered at the Hashemite University by the Department of Physical Education and Sports Science. In one particular section of this course, about 100 students are enrolled. Within this group, 30% of the students have engineering majors. A survey was distributed to these engineering students to gauge their opinions on this specific course. The survey aimed to understand why these students were taking this particular course and its relationship to their engineering education. Besides gauging the opinion of the students on this specific course, a hypothesis was also formulated by the authors. One part of the hypothesis was the belief that students like this course because they see the importance of physical activities to their education process. It was a surprise however to see that this motivation was not the leading factor in the students decisions to take this course. Instead, the leading factor was to get a good grade in this PE course to balance the grades of the engineering courses they take. Nonetheless, the paper provided a lot of information which might be helpful to decide whether engineering programs should include mandatory physical education courses in their curricula or not. P ge 13525.2