Rec Sports Personal Training Coordinator, Cathy Sullivan, and Dee Gillen, CPHHS Faculty Staff Fitness Coordinator have strategically assembled a collection of courses and hands-on experiences that help students step through three experiential levels from apprentice to practitioner to mentor, with the ultimate goal of competitive job placement, post-graduation. “When I started my professional employment as a personal trainer, just after completing my undergrad, I had confidence in my knowledge of science and my ability to apply it. What surprised me was the need to wear both the ‘business’ and the ‘empathetic leader’ hats. Wearing the ‘business hat,’ I had to navigate terrain related to policies and financial transactions, client programming, and work relations with a diverse team of personal trainers. Wearing the ‘empathetic leader hat’, I had to develop caring relationships with clients, as their friend, leader, and mentor. This felt especially challenging when clients were much older than I was,” says Ms. Sullivan about the expectations/demands of the Personal Training profession.

The resultant Resistance Training Leadership Series weaves together four types of forums: credit courses (PAC & KIN), non-credit workshops, professional certifications, and practical leadership experiences.  This series takes advantage of the existing course catalog and introduces two new learning forums.  A volunteer/practicum Peer Team engages students at the apprentice level to invite and inspire non-exercisers to find an activity they love.  The Leadership Workshop is offered at the practitioner level as an alternative to KIN 394, and includes the basic tools for leading full classrooms as well as individual client sessions, including concepts of growth mindset, risk management, accessibility, group dynamics, and other learning theories. Students have several options for meeting the practical requirements at each level, including volunteer and paid placement.

A grant from OSU’s Women’s Giving Circle recognizes gender and socio-economic disparity in resistance training participants and helps address fiscal barriers with fee waivers for workshops and professional certification.  This delivery model includes experiential learning and faculty-student engagement – both of which are correlated with student retention.  For the first year, Ms. Gillen and Ms. Sullivan will count success as providing experiential learning opportunities that complement students’ classroom experience.  “We will strive to challenge students, provide a safe environment for them to practice new skills and potentially fail, and learn from those experiences using a growth mindset.  We believe this ultimately serves their development more than ‘playing it safe’,” says Sullivan. She adds, “If all goes well, this might be a model for additional partnerships between academic colleges and Student Affairs departments.”