Fulbright Scholar at Ithaca College to Study What Makes Young People Physically Fit

ITHACA, NY—Whatever an effective physical education program may be, what it’s not is a teacher with a history degree tossing out a ball and telling students to go play for 45 minutes.

 

“There’s a very big difference between supervised recreation and an educational program designed to make young people physically fit,” said Wee Eng Hoe, Ph.D., a faculty member at Malaysia’s Universiti Teknologi MARA and visiting Fulbright scholar at Ithaca College. “When taught by trained teachers using the proper facilities, physical education classes give young people the skills they’ll need to engage in a lifelong program of fitness. In light of the dramatic increase of childhood obesity in developed countries throughout the world, establishing quality physical fitness programs in the public schools has taken on international implications.”

 

Dr. Wee has studied physical education programs in schools in his native Malaysia, where childhood obesity—once nearly nonexistent—is on the rise. In an article entitled “Childhood ‘Globesity,’” the International Food Information Council reports that nearly 17 percent of Malaysian boys and 8 percent of Malaysian girls are obese. Those numbers parallel the disturbing rise of obesity in the United States, where the Center for Disease Control reports 25 percent of America’s youth are at risk of becoming obese—a rate that’s doubled in the last 10 years.

 

“The United States and Malaysia are different cultures in terms of their approaches to education,” Dr. Wee said. “In Malaysia, for example, there is a teacher-centered approach, while American teachers and students both play active roles in the construction of knowledge. Still, in light of the growing obesity epidemic, being able to identify the elements of an effective physical education program would benefit developed countries across the globe. Currently, there are no studies comparing physical education in the United States with Malaysia. In that sense, my research at Ithaca College is groundbreaking.”

 

Based at Ithaca College’s Department of Health Promotion and Physical Education, Dr. Wee will spend the time between now and January collecting data from teachers and administrators in public schools New York State, concentrating on school systems in central New York State and Nassau and Suffolk Counties. Analyzing teacher training, facilities and administrative structures in the United States and Malaysia will produce a comprehensive comparison of physical education programs in the two countries. It will be interesting, Dr. Wee said, to see what common threads emerge.

 

“I selected Ithaca College as the place to work from because the institution has a long history of physical education, and I was impressed by that,” Dr. Wee said. “Also, in my university classes in Malaysia, I was using a text authored by Deborah Wuest, a faculty member in the health promotion and physical education department. I e-mailed her, telling her about my Fulbright research, and she agreed to make the arrangements to host me.”

 

In addition to coaching and teaching physical education in Malaysian secondary schools, teacher training colleges and the undergraduate PE program, Dr. Wee holds a master’s degree in physical education majoring in sports psychology and a doctorate in physical education from the University of Malaya, Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia. He has published extensively in a number of professional journals, including the International Journal of Eastern Sports and Physical Education and Journal of Educational Management and Leadership.

 

The Fulbright program was established at the end of World War II to increase mutual understanding between the people of the United States and other countries, through the exchange of persons, knowledge, and skills.

 

To arrange an interview with Wee Eng Hoe, contact Keith Davis in the media relations office at kdavis@ithaca.edu or (607) 274-1153.