For the Love of Sports
Holistic Approach to Supporting Division III Student Athletes

Gretchen Kreahling McKay
January 2023, 189 pags
ISBN 978-0-89641-629-1
$22.95 (includes shipping)

For the Love of Sorts
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In the fall of 2016, Gretchen McKay attended a home football game at McDaniel College, the private, NCAA Division III, liberal arts college where she has taught Art History for twenty years. That fall day in 2016, the team broke their losing streak. The following Monday she was asked to be the faculty mentor to the team. After five years in that role, and since many other faculty and administrators might not have the time to do this deep dive into intercollegiate athletics, McKay thought a book about her experiences with Division III college student athletes might help other faculty and staff think about how to support these students.

The book, based on the author’s own experiences and substantiated with published peer-reviewed research and student athlete focus groups, deals with issues such as the importance of “athlete identity,” stereotype threat, the mental health of student athletes, and teaching these “active” students among other topics. Since student athletes tend to comprise on average 25% of the overall student body on Division III campuses (a greater percentage that at Division I schools), a focus on how to recruit, retain, teach, mentor, and advise these students through to graduation is important for all colleges in this division.

The aim of the book is to help faculty, staff, and administrators of Division III institutions better understand and support student athletes at this level of intercollegiate competition. Division III is the largest membership category within the NCAA’s structure. With many Division III institutions relying on athletics to manage and increase enrollment, faculty and administrators of these schools would do well to learn how deeply connected these students are to their sport and intercollegiate competition. Understanding their mindsets as athletes may go far to help support these students to achieve more from their academic experience.


CONTENTS

  • Chapter 1: SO MUCH TIME AND ENERGY? WHY BOTHER PLAYING?!
    Importance of Understanding Athlete Identity
    Academics and Athletic Oppportunities
    Ability to Play in the First Year
    Other Reasons for Playing Division III Sports
    The importance of Seeing the Whole Student
    Faculty Awareness and Involvement in Athletics
    Practical Takeaways
    Endnotes

  • Chapter 2: THE ROLE OF ATHLETICS AND ENROLLMENT MANAGEMENT
    Why Some Students Choose Division III Athletics
    The Growth of Division III Athletics
    Athletics as an Admissions Growth Plan
    Research on Athletics and Admissions
    Practical Takeaways
    Endnotes

  • Chapter 3: ACTIVE LEARNING: TEACHING STUDENT ATHLETES
    Learning by Doing
    Group Work as In-Class Activity
    Competition in the Classroom
    Other Ways to Invoke Competition
    OK to Be Wrong
    Active Lerning and Importance of Movement
    Student Athletes as a Specialized Group
    Hybrid and Online Classes
    Practical Takeaways
    Endnotes

  • Chapter 4: FACULTY, ATHLETICS, AND STEREOTYPE THREAT
    Serving the Whole Person: Student and Athlete
    Faculty Mentors to Athletic Teams
    Other Faculty Mentors: Women's Soccer
    Other Faculty Mentors: Men's Lacrosse
    Mentors' and Coaches' Perspective
    Examining Stereotype Threat
    Roots of the Dumb Jock stereotype
    Sterreotype Threat and Mental Health
    Ways Student Athletes Cope with Stereotype Threat
    Ways to Combat Stereotype Threaat
    Athletic and Racial Diversity
    Title IX, Women's Sorts, Gendered Stereotypes
    Female Athlete's Perspcecive
    Practical Takeaways
    Endnotes

  • Chapter 5: MENTAL HEALTH OF STUDENT ATHLETES
    An Especially At-Risk Population
    What Can Faculty Do
    Patience and Consistency
    What College Counseling Centers Can Do
    Beyond Hiring More Conselors
    What Coaches Can Do
    Other Supports for Student Athlete Mental Health
    Practical Takeaways
    Endnotes

  • Chapter 6: HELPING DIVISION STUDENT ATHLETES TRANSITION OUT OF THEIR SPORT
    Career-Ending Injuries
    Sports Termination: Good and Bad
    Need for Social Networks Beyond Teammates
    Helping Students See Their Sport as Career Preparation
    Institutional Programming for Post-Sport Planning
    Keeping Connected: Planning the Trnasition
    Establishing a Support Network
    Practical Takeaways
    Endnotes

  • CONCLUSION

  • APPENDIX: A DAY IN THE LIFE OF DIVISION III STUDENT ATHLETES

ABOUT THE AUTHOR . . .

Gretchen Kreahling McKay is a tenured professor of Art History at McDaniel College. Winner of the 2015 Ira G. Zepp Distinguished Teaching Award at McDaniel College, she is known for her innovative classroom activities and deep student engagement across instructional platforms and speaks nationally on active learning in in face-to-face, blended, or online higher education environments. In addition to her teaching focus, McKay has held numerous leadership positions in higher education during her twenty-year tenure at McDaniel College, acting as Director of the Honors Program, Associate Dean of Academic Affairs, Special Assistant to the President, Director of the Center for Faculty Excellence, and Director of Undergraduate Research in the Humanities. In 2019, partly in recognition of her mentorship of student athletes, McKay was the recipient of the Charles A. Boehlke, Jr., Engaged Faculty Fellow Award, which acknowledges exceptional commitment to students at the college.