If you’re an EMU student then you have either taken or will soon take CORE 201, also known as Life Wellness. It is a class focusing on physical fitness and health and is a Core requirement, which means EMU students have to take it in order to graduate.
When I took Life Wellness in the spring of my sophomore year, almost two years ago, I didn’t quite know what I was getting into. I had heard from peers that it was a class focused on health and fitness but that was all I knew before starting the class. Even after the class began and going through the syllabus, I couldn’t have predicted the experience that was awaiting me.
The class assignments consisted of fitness logs, a continuous personal growth project, nutrition analysis, fitness related activity days and some reflection papers. At a glance, it may seem that there is nothing wrong with these projects and that they are reflective of what one might expect of a health and fitness class. However, these projects turned out to be inconsiderate, uncomfortable and frankly, unfair.
One of my major issues with the content of this class was the required nutrition analysis assignment and the way that it was structured. Students were required to log their food intake everyday for three days on a given app or website and then write a reflection about it. Upon creating an account for the app required for the assignment, you are asked to enter how much you weigh and what your ideal weight is. The reason I think this assignment is inconsiderate and can possibly be very harmful is because not everyone should be expected to analyze whether or not they are eating “healthy” and still feel fine afterwards. Personal struggles such as disordered eating, eating disorders, body dysmorphia or other struggles pertaining to food and physical fitness should be considered before assignments like this are created. As someone who has experience with eating disorders and body dysmorphia, I know that practices such as counting calories or setting food and body goals can be extremely triggering.
Another aspect of the class that I found harmful was the nationwide Presidential Fitness Test that everyone was required to partake in. At the time that I took this class, I was in recovery from surgery and wasn’t required to participate in person so I didn’t have to take the test. However, the mere fact that students were required to do this test, and in front of their peers too, made me feel very uncomfortable.
Like I mentioned before, body image issues are very common and are often a result of societal expectations of what physical fitness should be. I think that this assignment failed to consider this fact. Not everyone wants to do sit-ups in front of their peers; this isn’t 8th grade gym class (even then it wasn’t okay). We live in a society where diet and exercise culture have greatly contaminated individuals’ relationships with their bodies. Why are they expected to address that publicly in a college fitness class that they’ve been forced to take?
Not everyone is going to agree with me and some might even strongly disagree. However, I’ve seen the dark sides of diet and exercise culture all throughout my life and think that schools, at the very least, should consider this when addressing topics such as health. I have spoken to several students who have either taken Life Wellness in the past or are currently taking it, and they have all told me that they think many of the assignments are harmful.
What is generally considered “healthy” in terms of physical fitness has evolved throughout the years and personally, I believe it’s subjective. I just don’t feel like society’s unfair definition of physical fitness should be imposed on college students.
By the end of the spring semester of my sophomore year, I felt that Life Wellness had negatively impacted my mental health and that it should not be a Core requirement. I think Life Wellness can be a great class for people interested in this topic. But I do not believe that it should be a required course for all students to take and I highly encourage EMU to take note.