 Welcome to the sports playbook where we discuss solutions to issues that impact sports. I'm your host Angela Hazelett. Today's guest is Meredith Crawford, the assistant athletic director for student athlete leadership development at James Madison University, which is a division one school located in central Virginia. We are here to discuss the post season preparing student athletes for life after college. Welcome, Meredith. Thanks for having me excited to be here, Angela. Great. I am very excited to have you here as well. Meredith, I understand the mission of the student athlete leadership program is to develop a platform where JMU student athletes can intentionally focus on positive initiatives outside of athletics and academics to prepare them for life after college. Give us an overview of the opportunities you provide student athletes. Yeah, we only have 29 minutes to talk about that, right? The whole 29 minutes might be an overview. No. So this program has been around, this is our fifth year kind of of a fifth full year programming. And the program has really grown over those five years. But when you think about all the things that we're able to provide to our student athletes, the umbrella that kind of like what we're under, right? So we have workshops and seminars that we offer our student athletes every semester. They attend at least three a semester. It's something that's required of them to earn their Duke's lead point, as they know. And that content, those workshops, those guest speakers are all types of things, right? Personal development, professional development, life skills, leadership skills to get the student athletes really thinking outside the box to expose them to different topics that they might not have, you know, heard of before or been exposed to before. So that's our workshops and seminars. We have a career development platform where we're working with the student athletes one-on-one, right? Resumes linked in. We're getting them a mentor. We're helping them find connections to companies for internships and job postings. We have our athletics photographer instead of taking pictures of them on the baseball field. We're having them do a professional headshot for their LinkedIn profile, right? We have companies coming and tabling so that our student athletes can learn about opportunities for them, you know, after graduation. Community service falls under us. So as a department, JNU athletics strives to have about 5,000 hours of community service a year. Student athletes are required to do 10 hours a year. They rock that. They are going to open doors, which is our homeless shelter feeding the hungry. They're reading to elementary school kids. They're actually, they go to an elementary school every Monday and welcome their greeters for elementary school kids here. I mean, they're doing all types of things here in Harrisonburg, which is awesome. We have some leadership groups that fall under the Leadership Academy, like our SAC group, and also a Leadership Academy where student athletes kind of rise to the top, who want to be leaders and those captains on their teams. They have those opportunities to learn some skills to help them along with that. And then we just have opportunities for our student athletes to grow, you know, in conversation. We call them affinity groups, where maybe it's our international student athletes getting together, or maybe it's our, you know, our student athletes of color, or our LGBTQ student athletes, right? And opportunities for them to come in safe spaces and safe environments and learn from each other and support each other. And again, that exposure we talk about, right? And being exposed to things that maybe they're not quite sure about, right? Which is good. You're supposed to do that in college, right? Learn about each other in college. So that's basically the umbrella. There's a lot of layers to some of that, but we can get more into that. Absolutely. That's a really good overview of the kind of the different pillars and ways that you're serving the student athletes. Is this comparable? Do other universities offer similar programs to student athletes? Or is this something unique to JMU? No, definitely other institutions are doing programming like this. I mean, you look at your Power 5 schools, your Clemson, your Ohio State, your Nebraska, they have flourishing leadership programs with multiple staff, with, you know, the resources to give to all, you know, we have 500 student athletes at JMU. It's myself, another full-time person and a grad assistant serving all 500 of those athletes. So, you know, there are much more robust programs at some bigger institutions. But I would think at a mid-major school like a JMU, you look at like our current conference, the CIA, we're probably one of the more robust programs in the conference. I think Delaware has a really nice program too. But it's something that it's a hot topic. It's a newer program, right? I mean, we've only been in existence five years. So, when you think of like athletics as a whole, it's a newer type of thing that institutions are offering their student athletes. And it's great, you know, our coaches want us in those recruiting visits. They know that there's value in what we're bringing. So, mom and dad come on recruiting visits and they're like, heck yeah, we want you to be a part of this. Like, Meredith's going to help you get a job after college or help you apply to a PA school or whatever their goal is, right? So, they're all about it. It's really great. That's incredible that you get the buy-in and support from the parents and that maybe helps encourage the students to choose James Madison University. So, you're providing services to around 500 student athletes. How do you provide for the unique needs of so many individuals? Yeah, I mean, different things are different layers. So, like those guest speakers and workshops, everybody comes to those, right? Like I said, everybody has to get three points a semester. So, they tend three of the six that we offer. So, we average about 200 or 300 per workshop. But then I'll have a one-on-one meeting with a student athlete just about their resume or about their LinkedIn profile or our leadership group. You know, SAC is probably a group of like 50 student athletes. Our Leadership Academy is a group of about 25 student athletes. So, there is a layer of like what's required, right? Where we see everybody, but then there's that next step where if student athletes really want to make the most of their time here at JMU, they can be more involved and do more and get more out of it, you know, on that end. Yeah, absolutely. So, it's somewhat customizable. Yeah, absolutely. I really want to talk more about the workshops that you offer. And student athletes are required to attend. And you said it was three workshops a semester. So, that would be six in a school year. And you cover a range of topics to enhance life skills, leadership, personal and professional development. In fact, you have an upcoming workshop featuring wellness advocate, Chris Herron, who is a former professional MBA basketball player who is in long-term recovery from substance abuse. Why is he an important voice from which student athletes should hear? Yeah, I mean, we're super excited. So, he's our marquee speaker of the year. He comes next next week on March 9. And it's interesting, Angela, because a lot of our programming, you know, people ask me a lot, how do you come up with the topics or the people that come and whatnot? And, you know, we use our resources, right? You know, President Alger, our president here at JMU has given us names to look at. Mr. Bourne, Jeff Bourne, our AD has given us names. And Chris Herron actually is a name that came from one of our associate ADs. And we looked him up and we haven't done substance abuse in a couple of years. So, we try to, you know, make it a variety each year. So, we knew it was a topic that we probably needed to bring back because it's a very important topic and one that in college, you know, can sometimes get out of control if you're not aware of what's going on in your surroundings. So, we knew it was an important topic and we got this recommendation. And then we put them on the books and all of our coaches are like, we've seen him at other institutions we've worked at or there's actually a 30 for 30 on him that I'm trying to figure out my ESPN plus to be able to watch it. But, but yeah, I mean, to have that type of topic again, exposure, right? And I think a lot of people are really excited that he's coming to campus. Actually, our baseball team is the only team that isn't going to be physically here. They are going to be traveling that day. And we had one of the, the players came into my office like two weeks ago. And this is when you know they're excited. He said, we can't be there, but is there a way we you can live stream it so we can watch it on the bus? And I'm like, someone's listening to what I have to say. It's a good thing when they want me to live stream the speaker, right? So. Absolutely. They're excited about it. And they can relate to this individual as an athlete and probably some of the challenges that that their peers may be facing or you know, things that they may encounter. You've had some also some really other interesting programs to you've had a police department panel, you've had a session on the elections, body positivity, personal finances, entrepreneurism. I mean, this is a variety of things to can you highlight maybe one or two of those for us? Yeah, I mean, just looking at even this year's programming. So, you know, I saw on the notes we talked about named image and likeness, we actually had a name image and likeness workshop at the beginning of the fall because it's such a new topic right now in the NCAA and how our student athletes can, you know, make some money off of their name image and likeness as a division one student athlete. So we had a panel or a program on that. You know, mental health is a big topic right now in the NCAA and making sure that our student athletes well being is being taken care of. We had a speaker come in the fall Charles Clark. We actually have had him the year before over zoom in the in COVID and our student athletes liked him so much that we were like we're going to bring him back and they were thrilled right so that mental health that you know, overcoming adversity and still being healthy in that sense we were super excited to have. You know, we had a speaker in the fall Harry Dunn. It's interesting. He's a former JMU football player. He's a current US Capitol police officer and he is one of the officers who testified about the insurrection of the Capitol, the US Capitol on January 6th, right? So what a JMU connection, what like of course we want him to come. He was a former student athlete and the perspective that he brought of being pro police but so confused about what happened and you could see he was still processing a lot of it and he was so candid and raw with our student athletes. It was an amazing conversation, right? And again, that exposure, exposing our athletes to what this guy went through and is still going through. So yeah, I really feel like we are really intentional about like the topics we bring and it's great. We do a lot of panels like with alumni, with former athletes, with companies where the student athletes are learning just again, you said it before, they're seeing themselves right in that panelist because that panelist was a student athlete at JMU but now they're you know, the CEO of wherever, right? Or they're physician assistant or a pharmacist or you know, you need to bring it all together for them. Right. Well, in the Capitol insurrection is only a couple of hours away. So proximity, the geography and the timing of many of the student athletes being at JMU when that happened, I'm sure also resonated. Was that a well received session by the student athletes? Yeah, I think so. You know, we ask for feedback, we do, for them to get credit, they have to fill out a survey after, right? But it's all electronic. So we see the feedback really fast and you know, a lot of them were like, I didn't think of it like certain points he made, I didn't think of it that way or he opened up my eyes to this or both ways, both sides of the aisle too, right? Like you think sometimes bringing some sensitive topics can be some sensitive topics and people might feel a certain way about that. But both sides of all of that learned something, right? It was really impactful. Absolutely, absolutely. I can imagine that was eye-opening for many in the room. And you mentioned earlier about name and image and likeness and how you had a session related to that. I imagine there's lots of questions student athletes have. And for our viewers who may not know that, what's going on with that situation, but they basically under legal and legislative pressure, the NCAA has recently adopted a policy to suspend the name image and likeness rules for all incoming and current student athletes in all sports. This ultimately means that student athletes while in college now have the potential to make money off of their name image and likeness without compromising their eligibility in college athletics. So how has this rule change affected student athletes and your role with the student athlete leadership program? You mentioned having a session on that, but what kind of questions are you getting? Is there any follow up to that that you intend to tackle? And is this kind of a priority or pressing issue for many student athletes? Yeah, so I'll give most of the credit to a guy by the name of Stephen LaPorta. He heads up our compliance office. So I think a lot of the NIL stuff will fall in compliance because you want to make sure the student athletes are still following the rules, right? So we work with a program that's a national program that works with a lot of institutions called Influencer. And through that, our student athletes are able to kind of log what they're doing. Stephen in compliance is able to kind of give them a check like, yep, this is all allowable or permissible. And then they go on and do. Now I feel like, you know, we're not the alabamas of the world or these big schools that have the quarterbacks that are going to be, you know, the number one pick or whatnot. But I do feel like they're, you know, in a small town or small college town, right? Like Harrisonburg, there is some stuff that these student athletes can be doing to make a little change here and there. I always like, I always joke and actually Stephen said it was like, they should never have to pay for a meal when they go out to dinner now. They should say, hey, owner of the restaurant, I have 10,000 followers on my Instagram account. If I post a picture, excuse me, that I'm here, can I get a $25 meal for free, right? Seems like a no-brainer free marketing, right? Or $25 marketing. But I don't know. I mean, I think we're not seeing a ton. We're seeing, you know, the student athletes that are maybe saying like, I'm representing this brand or this product. And if you buy from my link, then I get, you know, a whatever percentage, you know, kickback from that. But we haven't seen any big things. I do say, and someone in a meeting, you know, early on with NIL stuff, you know, Odyssey Alexander on our softball team last year and how that blew up. And we went to the College World Series. If she had another year at JMU, that would have been very interesting to see, you know, what types of deals and sponsorships and things that she would have gone because she became a national name because of that, that run. And now she's making all types with the sponsorships she has now, which is wonderful for her, you know, but it's an interesting topic for sure. And it's ongoing. And Steven's doing a great job here at JMU. But we're not seeing a ton that you're kind of seeing at some of those bigger institutions for sure. Absolutely. And that's a really good point with Odyssey Alexander as an example, an individual who'd certainly be able to capitalize off of her notoriety and reputation. You know, only according to NCAA only 2% of college athletes actually move on to play professional sports. Do you prepare those athletes who may be going pro any differently than the rest of the student athletes on campus who may pursue different career paths? That's a great question. I don't want to squash their dreams, right? So there's a fine line, right? You know, I see it like, like the baseball or baseball players will come and I'm going to try to be drafted. Okay. And I don't want you to not try to get drafted because I was the college athlete, like I get it, it's only X amount of time in your life and then that's your past. So go for it, put all your eggs in that basket, work out, you know, your football players go on and then want to work out all that spring. And so yes. And even if it's almost like a gap year from college to professional, just to let them try that dream, because you're only 22 once in your life, right? Just do it, right? Work your butt off to do it. But I do try to, like at least let's like, let's see if you have a resume. What are you interested in if that doesn't work? Like have some of those conversations. We have something that we do with our athletes. Now it's called a professional toolkit. We use our canvas platform, which Angela, you're probably familiar with being a professor. And each semester, our student athletes have to submit something on canvas for this toolkit. And so freshmen, maybe it's like figuring out what major you want to be and sophomores, we have them do like a resume worksheet, where juniors, they're actually submitting a resume, submitting LinkedIn profiles. And then senior year, they're doing like a cover letter, and then actually like an alumni interview, so like growing their network. So different, different things are submitted each semester on their own time. It's a newer thing for them for this year, but we saw a lot of success in the fall. And I think that will at least allow all athletes, but especially those maybe wanting to go professional in their sport to at least have a baseline of at least a resume, at least one contact with that alumni interview. So that when they do fall back, and want to find, you know, what that next career is, they have something, and we always say like, come back and see me, I think of, we had a football player Marcus Marshall a couple years back, and he was great, he was in the business school, and he did all these things, but he went on it and, and went professional for a little bit, but then he came back. And he said, Meredith, can you help me? And I said, absolutely. And we found him a job, right? So even after the fact, they still come back and we're able to help them. Yeah, that's amazing that you offer that. And I hope more student athletes take you up on that opportunity. That's incredible. And then you're right. And maybe they do go professional, you know, again, 2% of college athletes may move on, but they at some point will have a maybe have a different career. So that's important for them to think ahead to that future. So ultimately, you're implementing a plan for JMU student athletes to have a well-rounded life after college. You were a student athlete and a two years starter on the women's basketball team at another division one school Georgetown University. And you are also president of the Georgetown Student Athlete Advisory Committee, otherwise known as SAC, and we're selected for the Georgetown Student Athlete Veteran Leader Program. Sounds like similar things going on here. It's just a mirror of things that are happening at JMU. So I want to know how your time as a student athlete and serving in these leadership roles actually prepared you for life after college. Yeah, my time at Georgetown was amazing. I wouldn't change one thing, you know, I played a lot my freshman and sophomore year and then you get out recruited, but I got a free education. So I'm not hurting because of that, right? I mean, that was a great experience. And I, and I think what what I did as a student athlete and what I try to tell the student athletes now to here at JMU is like, make the most of the time that you're at JMU all the resources you get as a student athlete, this leadership program tutors, people wanting to help you. I mean, all of the, all the things that you're, you're provided because of being a student athlete, get involved, go and do, join SAC, right? Go do community service. You don't know, you know, what that what doors can open when those things, you know, come around. Yeah, I mean, I always say like, my world has come full circle, right? I had that student athlete experience. It was amazing. Then I actually became like a fundraiser for athletics. So I was then brazing money for the student athlete experience, which was easy. I was like selling the thing that I had, right? I was passionate about it. I understood it. I was selling it. And then things happened where then I was able to like take over this leadership program, which I'm loving and it is it's exactly it's actually what I did my master's thesis on. When I got my master's at Georgetown was I put together a curriculum for student athletes, you know, in 2011, right? So 11 years ago for student athletes to prepare for life after college. Like, what does that look like a curriculum to do this? And now I'm, I'm doing it, right? Now you're doing it. Is there anything at your time at Georgetown that you wish you'd had something maybe you're offering students today that you wish you had a decade ago? Yeah. I mean, so the SAC group was something that now we're doing SAC and that veterans leaders group was more of like the Leadership Academy that I was talking about. That was more of a group of like 40 athletes. I think they did like two per team or something like that. So they didn't have this robust leadership program. And I hear that a lot from alumni at JMU or alumni everywhere where it's like, man, if there was some type of program like that, how far ahead would we be? Or it's really awesome. And I know Georgetown has one now and it's amazing. I mean, sometimes, you know, you kind of look at what other schools are doing and you not copy and steal, but you're kind of like, oh, we could, something like that could work at JMU. And you do that, you know, across the board for a lot of things. And Georgetown has one now and it's great. So I think having that there, but I mean, honestly, to be interested in working in sports in Washington DC, I did my masters there when all of my professors, I did, I got a sports management masters, all my professors were working in the industry because they were right there in DC, right? So honestly, my experience was great. I wouldn't change a thing. And as you know, I'm a husband and I have this beautiful family because of Georgetown. So all good things happened there. Absolutely. And in, you know, in the last decade, how really have things changed since you were a student athlete? Maybe a little more than a decade, but what is different? And you mentioned that the leadership program has really grown and support for student athletes, but what else is different? What else are student athletes facing today that's different than you experienced? Yeah. You know, I think in the world we live in, I feel like student athletes, there's a lot on everybody's plate, not just student athletes, students plate, right? We talk about this whole mental health topic of point of emphasis right now in the NCAA. That wasn't something that we talked about, you know, when I was a student athlete, but I'm sure there were some of my teammates were going through things, right? So trying to tear down that stigma now and make it a place of, you know, opportunity and openness and willingness to talk. So I think that's a positive change. I think our student athletes are very scheduled, right? They have a lot to do every day. And we want them to be less scheduled, but we also want them to be, you know, efficient and get their work done and what. So what's that balance, right, for our student athlete? Right. It's hard. So I think, you know, there's a lot of the world we know, right? Like social media really wasn't a thing even just 10 years ago. Like there was a little bit of Facebook, but that was it. And so how connected our athletes are to, you know, right now what's going on in Ukraine and what's like this weighs on everybody all the time because we're so connected to what's happening everywhere, right? You think of the social injustice and the DEI topics that have been going on recently. Student athletes are all about wanting to stand up for what is right and be a part of that voice, which is amazing, right? They're taking ownership of that and know that they have a platform to influence others or impact others or share to others that they support them. So they're doing that. So there's a lot of good, you know, good in that. But I think you just need to take care of themselves and know that there's a balance, right? Absolutely. Absolutely. Let's kind of get into the scheduling piece just briefly as we're nearing the end of our time together. But you know, students athletes are really highly scheduled and that kind of adds to the pressure and that mental health issue you're mentioning. They have about 20 hours a week dedicated to their sport, 15 hours a week in class, several hours a week each studying for their classes. You are requiring these additional workshops six a year that they're required to attend 10 hours of community service. So what kind of support from the administration do you get to require participation from student athletes who are so busy and have coaches and athletes bought into this? Yeah. I mean, I think they have and that's why we're so intentional about what we're bringing because we want it to be something that's worth their time, right? We don't just want it to be something to check off a box, but we want them to get something out of it. So Mr. Borner, athletic director from the start, he has supported the leadership program and that has trickled down to the coaches, which then is trickled down into the sports teams. And I won't like not every single sports team here, we have 18 is 100% bought in, but most of them are and we're seeing that and the ones that are bought in are seeing some real return on that with what they're doing. With COVID, before COVID we used to do all of our workshops in person. With COVID we went virtual and now we're in a hybrid. We found that it's okay to meet them where they're at. They've had this full day and then there's a Duke's lead event at 7 p.m. Let's make this one on Zoom, right? So I think finding those areas where we can make a little bit of an adjustment to help the student-athlete out is really important. Now Chris Herron, everyone will be there in person at the basketball arena. But the baseball players want to be on Zoom for that one. Exactly, but the baseball players can be on Zoom, but nobody else, right? Well, that's amazing. It's a lot of great work that you're doing to support the student-athletes and I hope they recognize and appreciate and take advantage of all of the resources that you're offering them to be successful in their future. So thank you so much, Meredith, for your insight into the post-season, preparing student-athletes for life after college. And thank you to our viewers for joining us today on the sports playbook. In two weeks' time we'll have our guest, Matt Sanja, who will discuss his experiences with the Greater Cleveland Sports Commission. We will see you then.