Juggling: N.U.'s Biggest Varsity Sport
Co-op and athletics a precarious, productive
balance.
By Paul Perillo
Every day, the routine is the same. The tall, athletic girl races to
catch the Green Line trolley, a gym bag in one hand and her work papers
in the other. Exiting the train, she hurriedly tries to tuck in her shirt
as she heads to Dockser gym, where volleyball practice is about to begin.
She doesn't usually have time to properly
stretch and prepare for the practice, but that doesn't matter to Lisa Nolan.
The important thing is that she has successfully made it from her co-op
job to practice-on time-and her focus has shifted accordingly.
"Trying to handle work and volleyball is a big commitment,"
says Nolan, a middler majoring in journalism. "The season is in the
fall, so I try to co-op in the winter and spring so I'm not interfering
with games. But we have regular workouts and the girls on co-op have to
lift weights and then go to work.
"Basically, during co-op, my life consists of sleeping, eating,
working out for a couple hours, and working. I have little time for anything
else."
As an aspiring graphic artist, Nolan has worked at Allied Advertising
in Boston and is currently employed at the Boston Globe. Some of her duties
have included promoting movies for motion picture studios, setting up free
screenings, and giving away promotional items.
Since she started at the Globe in January, Nolan has fallen in love
with the layout and design business and hopes to remain involved with it
in some capacity after graduation. "I really enjoy the editorial design
part of my job," she says. "Having the opportunity to work in
my field as a part of my co-op is what I came to Northeastern for. Chasing
the T to make practice and not being able to keep my eyes open when I get
home . . . I wouldn't have it any other way. Sure, it's tough to balance
my job and my volleyball, but all of this is preparing me for life."
Nolan's story is not an uncommon one around Huntington Avenue. As the
largest cooperative education university in America, Northeastern demands
a little bit more of its students than the average school.
For N.U.'s athletes, those demands are even more evident. While most
Northeastern students balance their schoolwork with a co-op job, athletes
are forced to add a commitment to their teams as well. Sometimes, as in
Shannon Meyers's case, that extra effort can be a monumental task.
Meyers is a goaltender on N.U.'s nationally ranked women's hockey team.
She's also a senior majoring in nursing with hopes of attending medical
school after she graduates. There are times when the two mix about as well
as Jerry Falwell at a Marilyn Manson concert.
"The biggest problem was time," says Meyers, who holds school
records in games played in goal, wins, saves, and goals-against average.
"I had to do a lot of stuff without the team. Things like lifting
weights and team runs . . . it's tough to do that stuff by yourself. I
really missed spending time with my teammates.
"I got to the point where I had to choose to put my whole heart
into one and not the other. My grades were starting to slip and I was having
this really huge internal conflict. I wanted to be sure to do well enough
in school to go on to med school."
Midway through her senior season, Meyers broke a finger and was forced
to step away from hockey for a few weeks. When she returned, her mind was
made up. "I came back with my heart into the team, but I knew my grades
were suffering. I tried to be as supportive of the team as I could. We
have a sophomore goaltender, Erika Silva, who is amazing. She played pretty
much all the games down the stretch. It was the first year I had that conflict.
I never had to choose before, but I don't have any regrets. I love my team,
but I love nursing, too."
Meyers's co-op boss, Cindy Taylor, is a nurse manager at the New Medical
Center in Boston's Chinatown. Before Meyers, she had never hired an athlete
before and had no idea what she was getting into when Meyers applied for
the job.
"Fortunately, Shannon was extremely flexible and worked very hard
to succeed in the hospital," says Taylor. "She has been available
for weekends, night shifts, holidays . . . not just Monday through Friday.
Her games were on the weekends, so that meant she had to work over Christmas
and wasn't able to go home to Canada for the holidays. I don't know how
she always balanced her professional goals with her hockey career."
Taylor was so impressed with Meyers's ability to budget her time that
she not only plans to hire her on a per diem basis after graduation but
also wouldn't hesitate to offer another athlete an opportunity at the hospital.
"I was willing to go the extra mile for her because she is so gifted,"
says Taylor. "She's very good with patients and her interpersonal
skills are excellent. Sometimes things get handed to athletes, but that's
not the case with Shannon. She worked for everything she got and our experience
worked out so positively that I would definitely welcome another athlete."
Taylor is not alone in her beliefs. Many prospective employers agree
that the right kind of athlete can be an asset to any company. Jacqueline
Sweeney, the co-op coordinator for communication studies, feels that athletes
have several strong characteristics that make them attractive hires.
"Obviously, not everyone is the same, but many of our employers
have requested athletes because, as a rule, they are great time managers,
they work well under pressure, they have great communication skills that
they've learned through being part of a team, and they are good organizers,"
Sweeney says.
Of course, not all athletes successfully juggle the combination of co-op
and sports. Sweeney has seen many come into her office at the last minute
looking for that perfect job.
"Sometimes, athletes can be a challenge," she says. "We
try to start the co-op process with them as early as possible because they
can fall behind easily with the demands of their seasons. If we can get
them in here early enough, they usually have a lot of success finding the
jobs they want."
Harold Miller is an example of how the rigors of a season can leave
even the most conscientious students behind. Miller has been a guard on
the men's basketball team for the past four years and has done his co-ops
on campus until this quarter.
"It's tough, especially because it was the winter season in basketball
and we were on the road so much," says Miller, who is a sociology
major scheduled to graduate in June 2000. "It was tough to meet with
advisers and I'm still a little behind looking for a job.
"I worked in the business office and finance office at Northeastern
before. That was easy because of the quick access from work, which allowed
me to slide right to the gym in a minute. It can be hard balancing a job
and athletics because of the road trips. It's all worked out very well
for me, though, and Northeastern has been the best situation I could be
in."
While Miller spent a lot of his co-op time on campus, Steve Arienta
chose to work close to home in Parsippany, New Jersey. Arienta is a sophomore
fullback on Barry Gallup's football team. He's also a criminal justice
major and hopes to become a state trooper or police officer after he graduates.
Arienta spent the winter working as a security guard at the Roosevelt
Hotel in New York City. He commuted into the city each morning from his
parents' home and had to find the time to remain on the rigorous off-season
training program required by strength and conditioning coach Joel St. Cyr.
"The program basically consists of running on Monday, Wednesday,
and Friday and lifting on Tuesday and Thursday," says Arienta. "This
offseason, I had to be at work by 9 a.m., and it's an hour commute into
the city, so I had to get up around 5:30 to run between 6 and 6:30. Then
I had to go home to shower and change for work. I came home around 5 and
had to lift. Working out is kind of stress-relieving. After working every
day, getting into the gym can be the most relaxing thing."
Despite all the hardships that go with co-op and football, Arienta feels
it's the perfect way to prepare for life. "Balancing football and
co-op is all about hard work," says Arienta. "That's what Coach
Gallup teaches: 'Do you want it bad enough?' Sometimes you can come home
from work and you're tired but you still have to work out. You have to
love it.
"Co-op teaches you that working for a living every day is not easy-but
you have to do it. Coach St. Cyr and Coach Gallup stress workouts and there's
nobody there to yell at you. But that's the Northeastern type of student
anyway, the kind that works hard without being told. When you're by yourself,
you find out what kind of person you are-you eventually have to answer
the questions anyway so you might as well do the work."
Further complicating the co-op athletics challenge is the athletic schedule.
Most students can work any and all hours of the day. But athletes must
fit practices and workouts into their work load. For some, this eliminates
a lot of great job opportunities.
Felicia Burroughs, a psychology/early child development double-major
and member of the America Eastchampionship women's basketball team,
is one such student-athlete. Burroughs has worked at day-care centers and
schools in hopes of becoming a child psychologist. Much of her school time
is taken up by basketball practice, however, making her ineligible for
several attractive co-ops.
While there are clearly pros and cons to being a student-athlete while
going through the co-op experience, the dedication necessary to succeed
in both is tremendous. Racing from law firms and hospitals to ice rinks
and tracks can wear down even the hardest-working students.
Women's track team member April Graff, a senior from Sparta, New Jersey,
who wants to attend law school when she graduates, sums up the dilemma
for many of her fellow Huskies: "Why do I do this? I rack my brain
because it creates so much anxiety for myself. But I do it because I really
love it, and in order for you not to lose your mind, you really have to
love it."
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