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Coursework for life
CHAMPS/Life Skills program keeps pace with evolving student-athlete culture
CHAMPS/Life Skills program keeps pace with evolving student-athlete culture
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By Michelle Brutlag Hosick
The NCAA News
The NCAA News
When the NCAA CHAMPS/Life Skills program began more than a dozen years ago, student-athletes were just being exposed to new technological advances like the World Wide Web and electronic mail. Now, student-athletes are sending text messages in class and blogging for extra credit.
The world of the student-athlete has changed dramatically since CHAMPS/Life Skills started, and by necessity, the program has evolved with it. Once viewed as an elective program to help student-athletes “catch up” with life skills they may be lacking, now the program is a prerequisite to college life and beyond. Its core mission, however, remains the same — to support student-athlete development initiatives of NCAA member institutions and to enhance the quality of the student-athlete experience within the context of higher education.
Kate Riffee, now director of donor relations and stewardship at Ohio State University, was an athletics counselor back when she started to think that perhaps the NCAA and its member institutions should address the issues that made student-athletes perform poorly in the classroom instead of simply dealing with the symptoms by throwing more tutors at them. After a few workshops and speakers, Riffee said it was clear there was need for more comprehensive programming.
“We always tell prospects when they’re being recruited that everybody uses the term ‘student-athlete,’ but that’s only two of the many roles they play. Yes, they are a student and yes they are an athlete, but primarily they are a thinking, feeling human being,” Riffee said. “Yes, we can help you academically and yes, we can help you athletically, but we’re also going to help you develop as a total person because those life issues are going to be the things you carry with you as you leave here. We don’t want to prepare you for the four years (of college); we want to prepare you for life.”
CHAMPS/Life Skills was founded in 1994 after Riffee and others met with NCAA Foundation officials, partnered with the Division I-A Athletics Directors Association and secured a commitment to serve student-athletes’ human needs.
Today, institutions approach the mission in different ways, depending upon the individual “needs assessment” done on each participating campus. Rebecca Gigli, assistant director of athletics and academic services for student-athletes at Drexel University, said the needs assessment, which tailors programming to each campus, is one of the program’s strengths.
Diversity of mission
“One of the philosophical underpinnings of the program is the need to serve your constituency, whether it’s the (University of Pennsylvania) Quakers across the street or the (Drexel) Dragons,” she said. At Drexel, the program is more community-service oriented, she said, while Villanova University uses it to run an alumni career-connections program.
“It’s all based on the needs assessment,” Gigli said.
Part of serving your constituency is working with programs already available on campus for the general student population. Becky Ahlgren-Bedics, NCAA associate director of education services, said the program does not advocate a “separate but equal” approach.
“You don’t have to re-create what’s already on campus,” she said. “We encourage coordinators to work with the experts already on their campus, keeping in mind that not everyone on campus understands the context of the student-athlete.”
Though each campus might have different individual needs, Gigli, who serves on the NCAA CHAMPS/Life Skills advisory team, said she has seen a general shift in the nature of programming because of the change in both the student-athletes and in the specialization within athletics departments.
“Our students are more sophisticated. The generation we’re dealing with is the most educated generation yet. They are probably the most traveled on our campuses, the most diverse,” she said. “We don’t need to teach them so much time management as we do life planning because they come to us positioned and ready to start thinking about life after college almost immediately.”
Ahlgren-Bedics said that some athletics departments themselves are specialized enough now to not require some of the programming CHAMPS/Life Skills had provided in 1994 — schools hire learning specialists or sport psychologists or nutritionists to help student-athletes deal with the type of “remedial” issues that had been covered in programming sessions.
Technological advances alone have caused the advisory team to reconsider the types of programming offered. Ithaca College Associate Athletics Director Michael Lindberg said that changes in technology are sometimes difficult for administrators to handle.
“We need to be more understanding and informed on how students communicate, how they receive information, how they learn,” Lindberg said.
Other shifts can take place on individual campuses, he said, because a need will be identified — like for more nutrition information or mental health services — and the athletics department will address it by hiring a nutritionist or a sport psychologist. Then the next needs assessment will reveal another area in which student-athletes could use some assistance.
“It’s kind of a moving target,” he said.
Changing with the times
The program has grown nationally every year, adding an average of 42 participating institutions annually and hosting about 300 people at the CHAMPS/Life Skills Orientation and Continuing Education Conference every year. The growth allows new ideas to flow, Lindberg said.
Clint Brown, assistant football coach at Wayne State College (Nebraska), is one of the newest CHAMPS/Life Skills coordinators. He said his school’s program is structured to allow student-athletes to attend different development sessions based on their personal interests. Among the more popular sessions was one with a sport psychologist and another on the effects of methamphetamines.
“This program opens up doors for kids, gives them more of a well-rounded education,” Brown said. “They get their education from the classroom, but this should open their eyes to some other things. They might not have these opportunities if the program was not in place.”
Gigli noted that in the future, campuses might have to learn to harness the technology at their fingertips to cater to an audience that wants more information in that format.
“(Student-athletes) are hooked to their technology,” she said. “They want to be able to walk across campus and as they’re walking to class, access something in their BlackBerry, whether it’s a workshop that can be put online or time-management assessments. They want to be able to tap into it 24-7.”
But using the technology should not cut out the heart of student-athlete development, she said — personal interaction.
“I think from that standpoint, athletics is becoming even more important on college campuses, because athletics is a nexus where people can come together, physically see each other and work toward something in person,” she said. “As the business mentality of the whole athletics enterprise will continue to grow, I think CHAMPS/Life Skills will always be an anchor.”
For more information about the program, contact Ahlgren-Bedics at 317/917-6335 or bahlgren@ncaa.org.
The world of the student-athlete has changed dramatically since CHAMPS/Life Skills started, and by necessity, the program has evolved with it. Once viewed as an elective program to help student-athletes “catch up” with life skills they may be lacking, now the program is a prerequisite to college life and beyond. Its core mission, however, remains the same — to support student-athlete development initiatives of NCAA member institutions and to enhance the quality of the student-athlete experience within the context of higher education.
Kate Riffee, now director of donor relations and stewardship at Ohio State University, was an athletics counselor back when she started to think that perhaps the NCAA and its member institutions should address the issues that made student-athletes perform poorly in the classroom instead of simply dealing with the symptoms by throwing more tutors at them. After a few workshops and speakers, Riffee said it was clear there was need for more comprehensive programming.
“We always tell prospects when they’re being recruited that everybody uses the term ‘student-athlete,’ but that’s only two of the many roles they play. Yes, they are a student and yes they are an athlete, but primarily they are a thinking, feeling human being,” Riffee said. “Yes, we can help you academically and yes, we can help you athletically, but we’re also going to help you develop as a total person because those life issues are going to be the things you carry with you as you leave here. We don’t want to prepare you for the four years (of college); we want to prepare you for life.”
CHAMPS/Life Skills was founded in 1994 after Riffee and others met with NCAA Foundation officials, partnered with the Division I-A Athletics Directors Association and secured a commitment to serve student-athletes’ human needs.
Today, institutions approach the mission in different ways, depending upon the individual “needs assessment” done on each participating campus. Rebecca Gigli, assistant director of athletics and academic services for student-athletes at Drexel University, said the needs assessment, which tailors programming to each campus, is one of the program’s strengths.
Diversity of mission
“One of the philosophical underpinnings of the program is the need to serve your constituency, whether it’s the (University of Pennsylvania) Quakers across the street or the (Drexel) Dragons,” she said. At Drexel, the program is more community-service oriented, she said, while Villanova University uses it to run an alumni career-connections program.
“It’s all based on the needs assessment,” Gigli said.
Part of serving your constituency is working with programs already available on campus for the general student population. Becky Ahlgren-Bedics, NCAA associate director of education services, said the program does not advocate a “separate but equal” approach.
“You don’t have to re-create what’s already on campus,” she said. “We encourage coordinators to work with the experts already on their campus, keeping in mind that not everyone on campus understands the context of the student-athlete.”
Though each campus might have different individual needs, Gigli, who serves on the NCAA CHAMPS/Life Skills advisory team, said she has seen a general shift in the nature of programming because of the change in both the student-athletes and in the specialization within athletics departments.
“Our students are more sophisticated. The generation we’re dealing with is the most educated generation yet. They are probably the most traveled on our campuses, the most diverse,” she said. “We don’t need to teach them so much time management as we do life planning because they come to us positioned and ready to start thinking about life after college almost immediately.”
Ahlgren-Bedics said that some athletics departments themselves are specialized enough now to not require some of the programming CHAMPS/Life Skills had provided in 1994 — schools hire learning specialists or sport psychologists or nutritionists to help student-athletes deal with the type of “remedial” issues that had been covered in programming sessions.
Technological advances alone have caused the advisory team to reconsider the types of programming offered. Ithaca College Associate Athletics Director Michael Lindberg said that changes in technology are sometimes difficult for administrators to handle.
“We need to be more understanding and informed on how students communicate, how they receive information, how they learn,” Lindberg said.
Other shifts can take place on individual campuses, he said, because a need will be identified — like for more nutrition information or mental health services — and the athletics department will address it by hiring a nutritionist or a sport psychologist. Then the next needs assessment will reveal another area in which student-athletes could use some assistance.
“It’s kind of a moving target,” he said.
Changing with the times
The program has grown nationally every year, adding an average of 42 participating institutions annually and hosting about 300 people at the CHAMPS/Life Skills Orientation and Continuing Education Conference every year. The growth allows new ideas to flow, Lindberg said.
Clint Brown, assistant football coach at Wayne State College (Nebraska), is one of the newest CHAMPS/Life Skills coordinators. He said his school’s program is structured to allow student-athletes to attend different development sessions based on their personal interests. Among the more popular sessions was one with a sport psychologist and another on the effects of methamphetamines.
“This program opens up doors for kids, gives them more of a well-rounded education,” Brown said. “They get their education from the classroom, but this should open their eyes to some other things. They might not have these opportunities if the program was not in place.”
Gigli noted that in the future, campuses might have to learn to harness the technology at their fingertips to cater to an audience that wants more information in that format.
“(Student-athletes) are hooked to their technology,” she said. “They want to be able to walk across campus and as they’re walking to class, access something in their BlackBerry, whether it’s a workshop that can be put online or time-management assessments. They want to be able to tap into it 24-7.”
But using the technology should not cut out the heart of student-athlete development, she said — personal interaction.
“I think from that standpoint, athletics is becoming even more important on college campuses, because athletics is a nexus where people can come together, physically see each other and work toward something in person,” she said. “As the business mentality of the whole athletics enterprise will continue to grow, I think CHAMPS/Life Skills will always be an anchor.”
For more information about the program, contact Ahlgren-Bedics at 317/917-6335 or bahlgren@ncaa.org.
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