The CHAMPS/Life Skills program covers a wide range of student-athlete experiences, but the curriculum may not deal directly with the fact that eventually every student-athlete's competitive collegiate athletics career comes to an end either through injury, expiration of eligibility or other means.

The CHAMPS/Life Skills program, however, does have materials on dealing with loss, depression, grief and developing self-esteem that could be modified to help student-athletes struggling with the end of their eligibility.

"There is a loss of identity and a process of questioning your self-esteem when athletics are over," said Lori Hendricks of the NCAA education outreach staff, which supports the CHAMPS/Life Skills program. "Some existing programs within the CHAMPS/Life Skills materials can be used to provide support to student-athletes who are no longer competing. It is helpful to provide student-athletes with tools to move into a career, or simply to move on from athletics."

Kristen Evans, a former gymnast and currently the CHAMPS/Life Skills program coordinator at the University of Oklahoma, believes there is a definite market for CHAMPS/Life Skills to develop a specific program for injured student-athletes.

"Seriously injured student-athletes need some kind of support or it is easy for them to slip into a depression," she said. "If a student-athlete can no longer play, show them how they can still impact the team dynamic."

Evans herself is among the list of student-athletes whose career ended because of an injury. As a gymnast at Oklahoma, Evans tore her anterior cruciate ligament her freshman year and was forced to stop competing as a sophomore. On an indefinite medical scholarship, Evans became gymnastics coach Becky Switzer's student assistant coach. Switzer was key in aiding in Evans' recovery both physically and emotionally. She even helped Evans get her current job.

The CHAMPS/Life Skills program at Ohio State University includes a component that helps student-athletes make the transition from collegiate athletics to everyday life. The Positive Transitions course is a two-credit hour class offered under CHAMPS/Life Skills. The course is composed of three sections including sports retirement and developing an identity off the field, transferrable athletics skills, and career development.

Counselor Darin Meeker focuses on the qualities learned through athletics, such as time management and teamwork, that will help student-athletes throughout life. The career-devel-
opment component teaches student-athletes to write résumés and obtain internships, skills that busy student-athletes did not always have time to focus on. Other schools, such as Pennsylvania State University; Arizona State University; Texas A&M University, College Station; and the University of Wisconsin, Madison, are following Ohio State's lead and creating their own programs for "retired" student-athletes.

The University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill, is among institutions with an injury-support program that could serve as an example for other schools interested in developing a network specifically for injured student-athletes.

"Every student-athlete has to face a time when their sport is over," said Bryan Smith, M.D., North Carolina team physician. "The student-athlete has to adjust to that idea."

-- Crissy Kaesebier