Personal Trainers
August 12, 2021
5
Minutes

What kind of jobs can you get with an exercise science degree?

WeStrive blog featured image
Home
/
Personal Trainers
/
What kind of jobs can you get with an exercise science degree?
Author
Cory McKane
Blog Post Summary:

If you enjoy exercising or coaching other people then you should consider getting a degree in Exercise Science. This article will provide you with a list of advantages of the careers in line with Exercise Science and its impact on your future.

What Is an Exercise Science Job?

Exercise Science helps to examine one’s body to adapt to exercises. It deals with facilitating and understanding the relationship between exercise, the body, fitness, health, and diet. According to Maryville, it also entails various perspectives on human mobility, from historical to psychological to physiological.

People in this field take responsibility for ensuring client's safety depending on their ages and skills levels. With this, other topics of study within the Exercise Science vertical that you may find at different educational institutions include:

  • Athletic Training
  • Kinesiology
  • Exercise Physiology
  • Sports Management
  • Nutrition


An exercise Science degree also emphasizes chemistry, general physics, research, and even general and social psychology. 

Future of Exercise Science Jobs

The U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics mentioned that the field under Exercise Science is going to keep on growing. It conveys that the employment rate in this field will grow up to 11% by the year 2029.


If you are thinking of what you can do with your Exercise Science degree, here are some of the in-demand jobs for your reference:

Personal Trainer

Undoubtedly, it is one of the in-demand careers in Exercise Science, and it is expected to grow by 10%. A job in personal training is popular both in the United States and the entire world. There are many reasons for this, such as:

  • Companies giving their employees gym incentives to improve their productivity
  • People becoming more conscious about their health and fitness
  • Elderly people want to keep a functional body

In this job, you are obligated to modify a client’s exercise routines and monitor their progress. You must also assist your clients while they are exercising to ensure their safety and avoid injuries. With this, personal trainers must assess the strengths and weaknesses of their clients. There is obviously so much more that goes into being a personal trainer, but those are just some of the highlights.

How to Become a Personal Trainer?

Aside from finishing a bachelor’s degree in Exercise Science, there are various ways to become a knowledgeable personal trainer. You may attend a vocational college, minor programs, get an online degree, or get a personal trainer certification. There's a lot of accreditation certifications to choose from, such as:

  • National Academy Sports Medicine (NASM)
  • American Council on Exercise (ACE)
  • Fitness Mentors

Another career option is you can also become a personal trainer and work online with an app like WeStrive. Working online allows you to work anywhere in the world while still helping your clients grow.

Strength and Conditioning Coach

This career is another a good employment opportunity under the grounds of Exercise Science. It's a career that has become very high in demand as so many athletes are looking to improve their athletic abilities.

A strength and conditioning coach is a versatile type of job and doesn't mean that you only train athletes. Today, many local gyms around the USA are hiring strength and conditioning coaches because of the popularity of sports enhancement classes among exercisers.

Strength & Conditioning coaches job maximize the benefits of exercises to improve the performance and condition of their clients. They are also responsible for developing a program that will help prevent injuries and train clients with lifelong movement skills.

How to Become a Strength and Conditioning Coach?

A certification from a trusted organization such as NASM will do if you want to work as a strength and conditioning coach.

On the other hand, you typically need to have a bachelor’s degree in Exercise Science if you are aiming to work as a conditioning coach of a professional sports team.

Physical Therapist

Physical therapy work is another promising and swiftly growing career under Exercise Science. This profession is expected to grow by at least 22% over the next decade. The median pay for a therapist can reach up to $90,000 per year and that pay is expected to grow up to 28%.

A physical therapist usually works to help people trying to recover from an injury. They deal with the victims of car collisions, or any physical injuries, to help them improve their mobility and lessen the pain they feel. 

They are also the ones that work to heal injured athletes, often times along side a trainer or strength & conditioning coach. A typical situation they face, for example, is a torn ligament in the knee. Therapists can also help clients or patients develop a plan or program to improve their movements and prevent possible injuries.

How to Become a Physical Therapist?

Unlike previous careers, if you want to work in this profession, you need to have a formal education. A Doctor of Physical Therapy (DPT) degree is required for you to become a physical therapist. After getting the degree, you still need to pass the licensure examination.

Exercise Physiologist

The position of exercise physiologist is another promising and fast-growing field in exercise science. It became a popular choice for many with its median pay of $50,000 per year and rapidly increasing average job outlook.

Exercise physiologists work like the mentioned profession above. They design various exercise programs for a particular group of clients to improve their body movement or function. The patient’s flexibility and cardiovascular fitness are included in the exercise plan.

The physiologists will achieve the perfect exercise program after they analyze the medical history of their clients thoroughly. 

How to Become an Exercise Physiologist?

You need to have a bachelor’s degree or master’s degree in physiology if you want to become an exercise physiologist. Also, this job typically requires a board certification. As a side note, some self-employed physiologists enjoy the freedom of managing their own careers and love what they do.

Physical Education Teacher

P.E. Teachers usually hold an average salary of $42,500 per year along with school holidays’ benefits and pension. It is also regarded as one of the practical careers in the exercise science field.

If you plan to become a P.E. teacher, you will take charge of all the physical education classes in the school and often times coach their sports teams. Teachers push their students to live a healthy and productive lifestyle through playing sports. 

How to Become a Physical Education Teacher?

A bachelor’s degree focusing on the field of exercise science is essential to become a P.E. teacher. There are also times that a master’s degree, teaching credentials, or sports certification will help you be hired quickly.

Conclusion

A degree in exercise science can be an amazing career path as jobs in this field are continuously growing. If you're passionate about health & fitness then you can be paid while doing the thing that you love - exercising. Just do not be afraid to grab new opportunities in front of you.

Want to become a better personal trainer?

Make sure you're setup for online training with these articles:

About the Author:

Cory McKane is the CEO/Founder of WeStrive - a platform for personal trainers to manage & grow their personal training business. He enjoys working out and spending time working with trainers on WeStrive on how to manage/grow their business.


Subscribe to our newsletter to stay up to date with the WeStrive Blog & Podcast

Written by
Cory McKane
CEO | WeStrive
Huge fan of fitness - Even bigger fan of helping you with your fitness. I've been building up the WeStrive platform for over 5 years and I'm excited to keep building out the greatest Health & Wellness platform on Earth.

Read similar articles

1,000+ personal trainers and gyms are using WeStrive to grow their business...
why aren't you?

What kind of jobs can you get with an exercise science degree?