Being a Student-Athlete

I get asked all the time: What was it like being an athlete while in college? For those of you that don't know, I ran both Cross Country and Track during my four years at Xavier University of Louisiana. Running in college taught me some of the most valuable lessons I could have learned throughout my entire college career. Even if you're not a student-athlete, the things that I learned are great tips to help make your college experience a success.

My Experiences As A Student-Athlete

I came to Xavier on a full academic scholarship with a partial athletic scholarship to run Cross Country. This meant that I was of course required to keep my grades up (above a 3.3) and also dedicate my time to competing for my school. Starting my freshman year, my schedule looked a lot like the following:

5:00 - 7:30 am - Morning Practice

8:00 - 3:00 Classes/ Lunch

4:30-7:00 - Strength Training or some other practice

7:00-8:00 - Dinner

9:00 - until - Homework/Study

Throw quizzes, exams, and projects in there, and that's a pretty busy daily schedule. So I was dedicating about 5-ish hours everyday to practice and the rest of my day studying, doing homework, and sleeping.

As a student-athlete at the collegiate level, the team also traveled to various places to compete against other schools. Travel usually took place on Fridays and then we raced and came back to New Orleans on Saturday. That being said, not much homework or studying occurred on Friday or Saturday for me. Oftentimes, I would also be missing a class or two due to traveling on Fridays. All of these things taught me a lot about getting my life together in college.

The first thing being a student-athlete taught me was the importance of Time Management. With such a busy schedule, time management was the most important thing I could have learned. I was essentially forced to utilize every spare moment I had for either homework or sleeping. And then, I had to find a god balance between both.... because if it were left up to me, sleep would win over everything every time. I also had to stay on top of my class schedule based on my syllabi so I would know if I was going to miss an upcoming quiz or exam due to traveling. That would I could plan ahead and be prepared to take my exam early if that was what my professor wanted.

The next thing I learned from being a student-athlete was how to Learn Independently. Because of my travel schedule, I would miss classes and therefore miss lectures and material that would be on the exam. Even though I was absent from the class, I was still expected to know the material. So keeping up with my syllabus and keeping up with the readings were very important. I had to learn how to read my textbook and actually learn from in on my own. Because my schedule was so busy, it was difficult to go and visit professors during their office hours. So Independent Learning was definitely something I needed to learn, and how to do it effectively.

The last thing I learned from being a student-athlete was how important it is to have a Support System. My teammates are like a family to me! We had to be around each other for at least 5 hours everyday. So of course, we bonded! We were all on the same time schedule and because of this, we were able to hold each other accountable for getting our work done, while also keeping each other sane. We went on many adventures together and helped each other to stay up and study when necessary. We understood each other's struggles and because of this, we were a great team, both on and off the field!