WARRENSBURG, Mo. (Dec. 13, 2016) -- Coaches aren't the only people who expect a lot out of student-athletes. After all, they are students first and athletes second. In terms of time and effort put in outside the classroom, one of the most demanding degrees that a student can pursue is nursing. So student-athletes who chose to go into nursing have to be extremely dedicated on and off the field of play.
 
"Of course basketball is the fun part," said Jennies Basketball senior guard Andee Wahlert. "But, when it's all over, it's do I have a degree, can I get a job somewhere and am I going to be good at my job? So it was really important for me to know that the nursing program was going to prepare me to be a successful nurse."
 
Here at the University of Central Missouri, we pride ourselves on our successful athletic programs and the Bachelor of Science in Nursing degree, which uniquely offers both urban and rural clinical nursing experience - with a 100% employment rate.
 
"I think that factored in a lot when I was being recruited by certain schools. Do you have a nursing program, or do you have a program that I can go into nursing after? When I started getting recruited by Lewis, it made the most sense," said Jennies Soccer senior forward Hannah Pyle about her decision to attend Central Missouri after being recruited by head coach Lewis Theobald. " I came here, visited, loved the school, felt at home – had an incredible soccer program and a great nursing school. I couldn't have asked for a better combination than UCM."

The good news for student-athletes like Wahlert, Pyle, volleyball player Mackenzie Harding and cheerleader Hannah Baker - over the years UCM coaches and the nursing program have worked together to make sure student-athletes are successful, all around.
 
"It's awesome because the nursing program and Flip, they work together in a way," said Harding when she explained how volleyball head coach Flip Piontek worked with her hectic schedule. "So I give nursing my conflicts with volleyball, and I give Flip my conflicts with nursing, and we each kind of just do the best we can."
 
"Well at first, I think I struggled with what every freshman struggles with – time management. I thought, this is way too much for me. But, looking back, it really wasn't that bad. Whenever we started going post season, it got a little bit tougher, but I was lucky that my instructors were really gung-ho about being able to do cheerleading. So they worked with me really, really well. Which I'm so grateful for," added Baker, who has been with UCM cheerleading for four years, a team that doesn't normally travel until the post season where trips can last days or even weeks. "It's gotten hard, but at the same time, I think that to be a good nurse, you do have to have good time management skills. So, it just kind of transfers back and forth between if you know how to do one, you can do the other."
 
"The clinical load third semester is much heavier than first semester. It's only once a week, it's not even every week, and it's about five hours. Whereas every semester they want you to get into being an actual nurse and working a 12-hour shift – getting report, giving report. So this semester has been the toughest, doing 12-hour shifts all the way out in Kansas City, and commuting back, and then doing soccer practice, individually, right after with my coach," said Pyle. Her 92 career points from 36 goals and 20 assists ranks second, all-time, in UCM soccer history. Her goal and assist totals both rank fourth, respectively, and Pyle scored seven of her final 12 goals in the last five games of the 2016 season.

 
"We all work hard in school as well as basketball, but, they just have a little more free time right now in their degrees. They get to kick back a little bit more. On bus rides, everyone studies a little bit, but I'll be the one with the light on the entire six-hour bus trip having to do stuff. I'm a little jealous of them," said Wahlert with a laugh. "They just don't have as much that they have to do outside of the classroom right now." Wahlert has 110 assists, so far, in her career with Jennies Basketball. The St. Joseph native has also grabbed 48 steals.
 
While balancing the nursing degree workload, clinicals, practice and gamedays is a challenge - sports and nursing actually have a lot in common.
 
"I think that with both of them you need key qualities. So, on a team, obviously you need your team work, you need your communication. You need to learn to work with a lot of different aspects of people, a lot of different characteristics, personalities," said Harding. "What's amazing with nursing is, I've been taught the same thing. They want team work, they want communication. There's a huge emphasis on communication, because that's how you minimize errors – medication errors, just errors in general – and the safety of the patient is what we key on." Harding had a stellar senior year with Jennies Volleyball while finishing up her degree. She totaled 161 kills in 2016 and an impressive 59 blocks.
 

And just like their teams on the court or on the field, these UCM student-athletes have relied on each other. Wahlert, Pyle and Baker have gone through the nursing program together, while Harding is in the same class as former student-athletes Julie Ireland and Nicole Pond.
 
 
"I honestly don't know what I would do if I didn't have them. Just because, we kind of keep each other in a check and balance system, like, 'Hey I'm going to be gone this day, make sure you tell me what I miss.' It's a little bit different than whenever you ask just anybody, 'Hey what did I miss in class? Oh nothing, the teacher lectured.' That's awesome, but, I just missed for classes," explained Baker about her bond with Pyle and Wahlert. "I think that it's been really, really good that we have each other, because we know, exactly, what it's like."






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