2.02

Recreation Management (Concentrations in Campus, Community, Outdoor, and Tourism)

Since our last accreditation, efforts have been focused on removing barriers that increase students time to degree. Based on meetings with staff from the CHHS Academic Advising Center, curriculum changes focused on restructuring prerequisites of lower division classes (REC 141, REC 225, and REC 325) so students can quickly move through the program. Generally, the first few faculty meetings of each Fall semester are dedicated to curriculum discussion and changes, as evidenced by our faculty meeting minutes. Several new courses have been developed, and successfully adopted, though they are not currently part of our core curriculum. This includes REC 201, Teamwork and Group Dynamics, as well as REC 168, Introduction to Tourism. As these courses are offered our plans are to continue to rework our concentrations to include relevant and up to date coursework. This spreadsheet details recent curriculum changes submitted through our curriculum and educational policies committee. Over the last year, the bulk of our changes have been focused on our Outdoor Recreation concentration, highlighted below.

Outdoor Recreation Curriculum Changes

The outdoor option at CSULB has begun its evolution from a resource management focus to emphasizing more general outdoor recreation and adventure leadership curriculum. This is evident with the addition of two new courses REC 434 Adventure Education Programming and Leadership and REC 435 Human Dimensions and Management in Experiential Education. These changes mark the shift towards providing a more holistic view of outdoor recreation and to help prepare our students for careers in an evolving industry with careers shifting away from traditional resource management and gaining in other avenues of outdoor recreation such as facilitated recreational experiences. Additionally, students can now take the Wilderness Studies Curriculum so that they can graduate with having actually spent time in the outdoors and can verify some acquisition of skills suitable for careers in diverse environments. No changes were made to the REC 431 Outdoor Recreation Resource Management course, which continues to be a core class for Recreation Management majors.

Recreation Therapy Curriculum Changes

1) REC 485 Fieldwork was added to the RT core courses as a requirement for all RT students (as of fall 2018 for the new cohort group who declared RT to be their major in fall 2018). This change was made because of the rigorous fieldwork requirement by California Board of Recreation and park Certification (CBRPC), Inc. The CBRPC requires a total of 1,000 hours of fieldwork experience in order for the applications to be eligible for the CA RT Certification exam. Thus, completing this fieldwork (minimum 200 hours) would certainly help students to fulfil the required 1,000 hours standard by the certification body.

2) REC 454 Counseling in Recreation Therapy was eliminated (fall 2017) from the RT Core Course list. However, it is still in the catalog and will remain as an elective course.

3) The dept. is in the process of proposing two new RT elective courses. The proposals were submitted in fall 2018 and are currently under a review process. National Council for Therapeutic Recreation Certification recently changed their policy on the number of recreation therapy/therapeutic recreation courses from five (5) to six (6). The policy will be effective as of January 1, 2022. Thus, it is required for the department of Recreation and Leisure Studies to add at least one more RT course ASAP to meet the Jan 1, 2022 deadline. Our recreation therapy cohort group who will graduate in May 2021 or May 2022 should meet this requirement so that they can sit for the exam. The two RT elective courses proposed are: Rec 455 Recreation Therapy for Physical Medicine and Rehabilitation and REC 456 Recreation Therapy for Individuals with Psychiatric Disorders