The impact of the 2012 Olympics and the rise in childhood obesity and other health problems means there’s probably never been a greater interest in the role that sport and exercise plays in people’s lives.

So where better, then, to study the subject in depth than in London’s Olympic heartland and at a university which takes sport and its role in the community so seriously?

It’s an exciting time to be involved in the sports industry. It’s growing and evolving as successive governments recognise the need for people to be active. Our course reflects this with its inclusive approach to sport and PE.

We’ll ensure you’re ready to deliver physical education or work in a community setting to improve people’s lives, both during your degree and in your subsequent career.

You’ll also explore ways of encouraging as many people as possible to throw themselves into sport and physical activity, particularly young people and those with disabilities.

You’ll share your first year on the course with your colleagues on the Sports Coaching and Sport and Exercise Science courses. The beauty of this is that you can keep your options open until the end of your first year in case you want to switch to one of the other courses.

In that first year, you’ll investigate the way in which sport has developed to become the multi-billion pound industry that it is today. You’ll also get to grips with the basics of the human body and how it works by studying human performance, along with sports psychology and essential coaching principles.

In year two, the focus will be on developing your knowledge and skills in relation to being an effective teacher/coach capable of working with a wide range of people. You’ll also be able to take optional modules on anything from physiological and nutritional assessment to examining how to create and implement a specific training programme. It all depends on your own interests.

By year three, you’ll be concentrating on your independent research project and you’ll undertake a work placement. We’ve developed a number of excellent placement opportunities with partners including community providers such as West Ham United, Leyton Orient and activeNewham, as well as a number of primary and secondary schools.

You’ll learn through a mixture of theory and applied practice, based at SportsDock. This superb facility at our Docklands campus symbolises the ambition and quality of all our sports courses. It’s so good that the mighty Team USA chose it as their training base to prepare for the 2012 London Olympics and Paralympics.

You’ll be taught by specialists in different areas. Specialists such as Nadia Grubnic, a PE expert who has researched the London 2012 legacy.

Our extensive industry contacts mean we can set up exciting work placements for our third-year undergraduates. Some of our students have the opportunity to work at the West Ham United Foundation. They include Richard Robins, who’s been helping to coach young goalkeepers at West Ham United’s football academy.

Vinay Ladhani is working on the new ‘Park Champions’ volunteers project at the Queen Elizabeth Olympic Park, developing opportunities for disabled people to make best use of the facilities on offer. Meanwhile, several of our other current students are involved in PE projects in local schools.

“I think one of our big selling points is the openness, accessibility and support our staff provide,” says Course Leader Richard Hunt, a leading figure in British disability sport for 25 years. “It’s our job to make sure you succeed. We think you come first.”

Our sports courses have rapidly built up a reputation for producing independent self-starters. The feedback we receive from our work placement clients is invariably positive. Employers want UEL sports graduates.

First of all, we’ve been producing terrific PE teachers for years. They’ve come from a variety of backgrounds. Take Dave Rainford. As his football career was winding down, the Dagenham and Redbridge midfielder decided to tackle our course and is now a senior teacher at a top sports school in Barking.

If you want to pursue a professional academic teaching qualification, you could go on to do a year-long, full-time PGCE at UEL or take our Master’s degree in Sports Management.

Several of our graduates are now working for activeNewham, the borough’s sports arm. They include Nicole Napier, one of their team leaders, whose work in encouraging local girls to take part in sport led to her being nominated for a recent Sky Sports award.

As sport’s importance in society is increasingly recognised, the opportunities open to you just grow and grow. You could move into sports coaching, become a community sports worker or end up managing a sports facility.

With good communication and presentation skills, you could work as a development officer for a sports governing body or a community organisation. The sporting world is your oyster.