What is the difference between Kinesiology, Human Kinetics, and Physical Education?
Although the universities may argue with us, our answer is not much! Our field is very broad and has been expanding rapidly over the last few years. Each of the universities in British Columbia have slightly different philosophical approaches to the field, and have different strengths and weaknesses. As a means of emphasizing these differences, the departments in our field at these universities have adopted different names. Thus, UBC is called Human Kinetics, SFU is Kinesiology, and UVic is Physical Education (with a kinesiology option)- and the University of Alberta is Human Movement Studies, and the University of Regina is Physical Activity Studies. Our preference is to use the term Kinesiology to describe the broad field and the use of a department name of Kinesiology and Physical Education is meant to emphasize the inclusiveness of our programming.
