Everything You Should Know About Athletic Training
Athletic training student Jennifer Holman ’18, shared her insight on all things students should know about athletic training before choosing it as a potential career path.
An athletic trainer is an allied health care professional who, under the direction of a physician, is responsible for providing immediate, preventative, evaluative, and rehabilitative medical care to those who become injured or ill. Athletic trainers are experts in advanced emergency first-aid care, human anatomy, injury evaluation and diagnosis, rehabilitation techniques, modalities, and protocols.
This year, Holman attended the Eastern Athletic Trainers’ Association (EATA) annual conference alongside 17 of her athletic training peers from Endicott College. The convention, a chance for both students and certified members to gain new knowledge and connect with one another, drew athletic trainers from different backgrounds from college and secondary schools to hospitals and professional sports.
For four days, our students participated in seminars and workshops covering topics like blood restriction therapy, prosthetics, suturing, and concussions. The event was an excellent opportunity for students to expand upon and reinforce the skills they have learned within our athletic training curriculum.
The conference’s jeopardy-style competition, The Student Quiz Bowl, proved to be a highlight of the trip. That’s because Holman took home third place among 19 participating colleges and universities, mastering six categories from anatomy to pharmacology.
Holman has completed six clinical rotations while here at Endicott, one being with the Endicott football team. Taking her real-world experience with her after graduation, she plans to seek a role in a high school setting. She eventually plans to work in a collegiate or professional environment with a baseball or football team. Here is the advice she shared on how to successfully navigate your own athletic training career path.
Know there’s more than meets the eye.
“It is important to understand that we’re there for the initial injury and then we’re rehabbing our athletes back to playing performance. We do evaluations. We send them out to other healthcare physicians. We’re more than just personal trainers.”
Be a people person.
“You need to have good people skills and good bedside manner to be successful. It’s the most important thing because you need to be able to talk to your athletes and learn how to make a connection. You want to have a conversation, so that they can trust you. That’s always one of my goals is to have them trust me.”
Be dedicated.
“The most surprising thing about studying to be an athletic trainer is how much work and dedication is involved. You have so many athletes you need to dedicate yourself to and make sure they’re going to be ok. You’re responsible for so many different things and you don’t realize what they are until you’re in the field.”
Make multitasking second nature.
“In the Endicott athletic training room, I had four different sports going on and I could be seeing so many athletes in any given day. You need to know who the athlete is, what their injury is, and what they’re going to be doing that day. Your priority is always making sure your athletes are getting what they need.”
Prepare to be rewarded.
“Being an athletic trainer is very rewarding, especially when an athlete gets injured and you’re bringing them back to completely full play. They’re trusting you to get them back to where they were before they got hurt. It’s really rewarding to see someone come back from an injury that way.”
For more information on athletic training at Endicott, contact Dr. Deborah Swanton, Dean of Sport Science and Fitness Studies at dswanton@endicott.edu or 978-232-2433.