Sport Performance

Competing well in sport requires not only physical virtues such as strength, speed, and agility, but intellectual and moral virtues such as good judgment, courage, self-control, and justice. The sport performance major educates students in the virtues needed for athletic excellence, sportsmanship, and Christlike leadership. Students compete in several seasons of intercollegiate or elite sport and take courses in nutrition, sports psychology, philosophy of sport, leadership, and other sport-related subjects which prepare them for different career paths.

Sport performance is a liberal art. An art is knowledge of how to do or make something well. A liberal art is a branch of knowledge of how to live well as a free human being. Free human beings rule themselves. Since humans are social, self-rule involves cooperative self-governance. Sport relies on two basic facts of human life: that we inhabit physical bodies and that we live with others. In sport, athletes test their physical and mental powers against those of their competitors, freely cooperating in an essentially social activity that humans love for its energy, beauty, and skill.

The sport performance major and minor use participation in sports competition as a primary mode of learning and therefore require students to participate in athletic competition through a university-sponsored athletic team or, with the university’s approval, by training for and participating in elite sports competitions such as those sponsored by the International Olympic Committee or a professional sports league. Petitions to use participation in elite competition to satisfy program requirements should be addressed to the program coordinator for consideration by the Sport Performance Committee.