All-American Gymnast Kendall Sanders Participates In 2021 NCAA Profession in Sports activities Discussion board.

Indianapolis, Ind. – Centennial All-American gymnast Kendall Sanders was one of a handful of student athletes across the country selected last month to participate in the NCAA Career in Sports Forum 2021.

The virtual event “Helps Future Sports Leaders Identify Strengths and Opportunities” and served 300 NCAA student athletes as an important and unique leadership training opportunity.

Sanders had an excellent junior season as she was named All-American First Team by USA Gymnastics on both the floor and all-around, and was also named an All-American by the Women’s Collegiate Gymnastics Association for earning her honor on the beam ( 9,681), floor (9,700) and all around (38,519). After an impressive performance at the annual MIC Championships on March 19, she received all of the conference awards as she finished fourth in the all-around with a score of 38,650 to earn the second team’s awards and received recognition as well of the second team on the floor with a 9,700.

She hit a new career high of 9.825 on the floor at the USAG Championships on April 10th and attended all eight women’s all-around meetings during the season. She had a phenomenal encounter on March 12 against TWU, the women’s final home game of the season, when she set new career high scores on both the bar (9.675) and the jump (9.800). She almost reached her career high score of 9,725 on the bar in this match, while she recorded an impressive 9,700 on the way to a career high score in the all-around (38,825). As a MIC Scholar Athlete, she was awarded a perfect GPA of 4.0.

Read more about the NCAA Career in Sports Forum 2021 and what Sanders and her colleagues learned and experienced below:

“Peel off the label. Know and live your” why “. Don’t go with the flow, be the flow.”

Jada Burke, an athletic coach on the women’s ice hockey team in Lindenwood, learned these lessons from her involvement with the Career in Sports Forum 2021 May 26-28.

“The opportunity to attend the Career in Sports Forum came at an important point in my life,” said Burke. “It opened my eyes to the great opportunities a career in sport brings with it. I now understand my values, passions and strengths and how I can use them professionally after my sporting career.”

Burke was one of 300 student-athletes selected to participate in the forum and participated in a three-day program designed for current student-athletes to explore future careers in the athletics industry. Open to juniors, seniors, and PhD students who had athletic eligibility in the 2020-21 academic year, program participants went back with a refined understanding of their strengths and potential opportunities in the sport in which to use those talents.

“We have been challenged to learn about ourselves, our strengths and weaknesses, and have been given a variety of tools to better prepare for our future careers,” said Chris Paul, a computer information systems major who plays soccer in Tulsa.

Throughout the forum, attendees heard from athletics executives on a range of topics including identifying outside of sport, understanding values ​​and culture in the workplace, networking, and building a professional brand. Speakers included Yolett McPhee-McCuin, Ole Miss women’s basketball head coach; Jonathan Orr, executive director of Athlete Transition Services; Erika Swilley, vice president of community and social responsibility for the Detroit Pistons; and Derrick Gragg, Senior Vice President of Inclusion, Education and Community Engagement at the NCAA and prospective Athletics Director at Northwestern.

“The NCAA Career in Sports Forum gave me the opportunity to listen to a variety of speakers from a variety of industries related to college and professional athletics,” said Wesley Parker, a physical education instructor on Averett’s football team. “Over the course of the forum, I’ve improved some of my strengths while discovering many new strengths that I didn’t know I had. Learning and improving those strengths will have a lasting impact on my future career.”

To foster relationships with the student-athletes present, participants were grouped into “color teams” of 20, where they worked with a trained facilitator. In this more intimate setting, student athletes completed and reviewed an in-depth personal strength analysis, received insights from young professionals about career search in athletics, and established peer connections that could last a lifetime.

“Building a community among our participating student-athletes was a top priority as these participants will continue to serve as a sounding board, support system, and even peers throughout their careers in athletics,” said Sable Lee, associate director of NCAA Development of Leadership qualities.

The event took place on an engaging virtual platform that provided dozens of resources for post-forum training opportunities for attendees. Speakers and guests fostered dialogue and interactivity by mimicking the feel of personal programming while providing access to an expanded participant base.

Inspired by the words of the speakers at the forum, P’Hariz Watkins, a member of Adrian’s basketball team who is doing a Masters in Sports Management, summed up his experience from the experience with a deep feeling: “I’ve learned that accepting your process is really open the gates to who you can be. You are the only one who can walk the path that presents itself to you. Once you have found ways to truly love yourself, embrace yourself and find your true happiness, then the results for you are endless. “

Participants in the Career in Sports Forum 2021 are ready to become leaders in athletics and inspire change in the industry. As McPhee-McCuin pointed out at her meeting, “Leaders must be learners.” The 300 student-athletes who logged on each day of the program proved that they all fit this description.

The full press release can be found here: https://www.ncaa.org/about/resources/media-center/news/program-helps-future-sports-leaders-identify-strengths-opportunities

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