General Education Framework s1

General Education Submission Form

Electronic submissions are preferred.

A. GE component for which course is being proposed:

B. Submitted by Brad Berky—Westmont in San Francisco

C. Ideally, submissions should be discussed by the entire department prior to submittal. Chair has reviewed and approved the course.

D. Course being proposed (please attach syllabus):

Health and Fitness in the Urban Context

E. This course Has not been modified, but is being submitted to check its suitability Has had its syllabus rewritten to communicate the course’s contribution to GE Has had its contents modified to address the relevant GE issues x Is a new course designed to fulfill the GE requirement

F. This course is being submitted as A Template. Applicable to courses with multiple sections which require only general training in the discipline. The submission should come from the department chair and should clearly identify what course content and what elements of the syllabus the department has agreed will common to all sections. Upon approval by the GE Committee, any course whose syllabus is determined by the department to meet the specifications of the template is approved to satisfy this area requirement. A copy of each syllabus should be forwarded to the GE Committee for record keeping purposes.

x An Individual Course. Applicable to courses requiring specialized training in the discipline or are typically offered by a particular instructor. The course should be resubmitted and reassessed in the event of a change in staffing or syllabus. G. Statement of rationale: (Include a list of the area certification criteria (former called GE objectives) and GE Student Learning Outcomes (if applicable). These certification criteria and GE SLOs are listed in the GE Committee Combined document. After each certification criterion and GE SLO, list several course activities (lectures, readings, assignments, etc.) that address it. If it is not completely obvious, explain how the activities relate to the certification criterion or outcome. Please attach a copy of the syllabus which has been annotated to identify the corresponding activities. Electronic annotations are required. Please use the comment feature in Word to annotate electronic copies).

See Attached Statement and Proposed Syllabus (modeled after approved PE course offer at Westmont in Northern Europe) Health and Fitness in the City

Westmont in San Francisco

Professor: Brad Berky

Course Description

This course is designed to help Westmont in San Francisco students stay active and healthy while offering opportunities to explore the landscapes, streetscapes & local opportunities for indoor physical activities throughout the City. Involvement in this course will give students practice in exploring new urban spaces, in minimizing your impact on resources, and in discovering how some forms of exercise can help relieve the personal stress of urban living.

This PE course is not simply an add-on for Westmont in San Francisco program as it will require learning about local neighborhoods and doing site visits requiring a fair bit of walking, more than you might do in your ordinary activities on campus, which may also require some planned time management. Perhaps less obviously, but more importantly, the intent of these types of physical activities are integral to our focus on difference, diversity, sustainability and taking responsibility for one’s own life & learning--i.e. becoming aware of how walking or cycling, instead of driving, engages the practice of using fewer of the resources that are often at the root of social-global inequality; how exercise not only relieves stress in healthy and productive ways but can also draw one away from a reliance on consumerist practices that further com-plicate social inequality and marginalization; how getting outdoors contributes to feelings of well being and connectedness that ready us as people of faith to more enthusiastically engage the world and its inhabitants. This course will also allow for regular opportunities to enjoy the company of others and discovering possibilities for bonding and shared interests.

Requirements

Activities:

Each week students will engage in at least one shared activity requiring about sixty minutes of physical activity. In the first two weeks of the semester, we will set aside time to do both hours of activity together. In some cases activities will be a planned walk, bike ride, or hike to discover and explore new places. In some cases it might be an alternative group event of field trip.

During weeks where there is only one planned activity (most weeks), students will also be expected to participate independently in sixty additional minutes of physical activity (having the option of dividing this time into two thirty-minute activities). Students can also share suggestions for these independent activities, and may often choose to do them in pairs or small groups and will happen outside of the other scheduled group activites. Documentation:

For some group activities, students will receive an assignment to create an iMovie that documents both their activity and success at becoming better acquainted with the City. Each group will collaborate on creating the movie, and we will share those films together in evening viewings.

Students will track their independent activity via MapMyWalk, MapMyRun or other approved fitness tracker program. Students will include the instructor in their friends circle so as to be able to share activity logs for credit. In order to receive credit for physical activity, students must move at a pace of at least an 18 minute mile, which is not strenuous, which will get your heart rate up for the 30 minute activity period. Students may also try an independent activity other than walking, running, hiking, or cycling that MapMyRun cannot track (such as basketball, yoga, zumba, etc.) upon approval of the course instructor.

Scheduled Group Activities

 Three neighborhood walking tours during the first month of the semester  Three class field trip which will be walked partially or in whole  3-4 TBA Bay Area hikes: Twin Peaks, Mount Tam, Tilden Park, etc.

Grade Breakdown

Individual Activity 65% Group Walks & Films 5% each (total 35%)