Students can release some stress this semester and earn a credit at the same time.
They can get 1 credit hour, for example, in PEDU 100N, which gives students a chance to learn enough about rock climbing to get started on their own.
“We have six classes, and two of those classes will be actual climbing during class times,” said Brandy Walters, who co-teaches the course with Jennifer Norman. “Students will get an introduction to an amazing sport and hobby that can last a lifetime.”
Walters said that the course offers advantages that students might not find if they took up the sport outside the university.
“If you were to pay a guide to go out on a day trip, you would probably have to pay over $100,” Walters said. “I feel like climbing has changed my life. My body has become more fit and stronger. The challenge, the social aspect and the benefits will keep me hooked for life.”
During the semester, students in the class will have the opportunity to participate in the class’s outdoor bouldering and rope climbing trips that usually take the group up to climbing spots in North Carolina.
Before they head out, though, students will prepare for the outdoor trips at Stronghold Gym, and they can learn effective climbing techniques in the classroom, too, Walters said.
Some students, like David Miles, have found that they enjoy climbing so much taking the class once just isn’t enough.
David Miles, a fourth-year biology student who decided to return for another semester, said that he sees a variety of benefits for interested students.
“[The course] gives students everything they need to know about various styles of climbing, along with hours of hands-on experience,” Miles wrote in an email response.
Miles also wrote that the class taught him life skills, along with the skills and techniques he needed to climb.
“It is very difficult to allow a complete stranger to literally hold your life in their hands,” he wrote. “No one in the class stayed strangers for long.”