My Top IUPUI Learning Experiences
When I think about the most impactful work I've had at IUPUI, these come to mind...
Personal Training Internship
through IN Shape @NIFS
Words that sum up my personal training experience:
Adapt. Progress. Learn. Rewarding. Confidence. Fast.
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This experience has taught me that I have what it takes to design a workout plan, adapt and progress to where the client is each session and make swift changes to a plan without compromising the ExRx in a high-traffic gym. Going in, I didn't know if I would be good enough, but I found that with some hard work in planning and learning how to encourage my client and give her the tools she needs, I am capable. I have been given high marks from my professor Dr. Rachel Swinford, graduate assistant Maddison Crisler, and my client that while she has been in this program 5 times before, she said I've gone above and beyond previous students to help her reach her goals and optimize our time together in the gym.
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The 10-week long INShape program allowed me to practice the knowledge and skills I've acquired in the classroom to work with a client. On the first day, I got to know my client during an in-depth, hour-long interview and collaborated with the client to make SMART goals. The first and last week we completed health-related and goal-specific assessments, and then the bulk of the time I gradually progressed my client in her workouts. I trained her for an hour twice a week at NIFS and designed weekly exercise programming that was realistic for her and aligns with her goals. It was lovely to work with a client who is intrinsically motivated to put in the work to reach her goals and is receptive to learning and trying different things. I used the knowledge and experience in the classroom and in a physical therapy clinic to integrate and encourage continuation of performing stabilization exercises of specific muscles to gently strengthen my client's pre-existing joint instability conditions (to avoid re-injury). Since I am not fully trained to rehabilitate clients, I did not do many rehab exercises with my client and referred her to continue the HEPs given to her by her PT, but this confirms my interest in physical therapy so that I can assist in both rehabilitation and general strengthening.
Overall, I have learned a lot about what it means to be a personal trainer in a gym, how to conduct a short session in a professional manner, and how much joy it brings me to encourage and train clients toward a healthier version of themselves. This opportunity has continued to confirm my interest in working with people and giving them structured exercise plans that fit their needs.
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Ask me about this experience! I have so much more to say.
Year-Long Strength & Conditioning Program
This document from 2021 is a culmination of the principles I learned in my Sports Strength and Conditioning course and the 4th edition of the Essentials of Strength and Conditioning from Human Kinetics. This project lays out goal-oriented programming for each sports season related to the specific population that is easy for an athlete to follow or coach to implement. This experience gave me practice in communicating with my partner and being discipline to show up to our scheduled bi-weekly or weekly times to work together and collaborate.
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Because of this project, I have more confidence in designing short-term and long-term strength and conditioning plans for a team or client.
Wellness Coaching
Image from the OneAmerica 500 Festival Mini-Marathon website 4/23/22
What is Wellness Coaching?
The goal of wellness coaching is to help a client clearly and realistically define their goals, discover what has and hasn’t worked for them in the past, think positively about the past/present/future, create action plans to succeed in their goals, and help them realize that they can do whatever they set your mind to.
What did you do?
I spent 7 weeks coaching a client whose short-term goal is to hit a personal record time in the 500 Festival Mini-Marathon in Indianapolis on 5/7/2022 and whose long-term goal is to build up healthier habits that improve their general health.
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Small Word Reflection: Learning curve, adapt, explore, flexibility, rewarding
Motor Activity Clinic
This class provided me the opportunity to work with a young girl with mental and physical disabilities for about 4 weeks. My sessions with her and her family over Zoom (due to COVID-19 precautions) taught me the importance of preparation; to have thought through the task, person, and environment (TPE) factors and possible modifications to help my client perform their best. While the preparation was laborious and time-consuming, it paid off during my sessions. The time that I was able to sit and think through relevant, accessible, and engaging activities allowed me to make swift decisions during sessions. When a modification did not work, I found myself being able to quickly implement modifications I prepared as well as be able to think about a new modification on the spot. While I am still not a professional in this area, my experience makes me feel capable and confident in working with people with disabilities.
Click here to learn more about the program.
3rd Clinic Activity Plan of program
Small Moment Reflection of Session #3
Honors Projects
Conducting Research: Walking While Distracted
I analyzed the effects of what watching a video on a phone does to a person’s medial and lateral sway, and I was able to gather six participants between the ages of 10 and 64 to look at the data with a developmental perspective. I took my data, analyzed it using SPARKvue and Microsoft Excel, and wrote a paper to communicate my results. My findings left me with many unanswered questions and more ideas about how to make the study I created better. I also used knowledge from my biomechanics coursework to make sense of the data and guide new hypotheses for a potential follow-up study.
Using Physical Fitness Evaluations to Develop an Exercise Prescription
I used part of the transtheoretical model with two non-kinesiology classmates to help them determine the pros and cons of working out to see if they were ready to exercise again in the near future and practiced facilitating and performing a battery of health-related fitness tests to then later help me create exercise recommendations and workout examples for resistance training, aerobic endurance, and flexibility for them to try. I coordinated times and dates with my willing volunteers and informed them of the expectations for each meeting and spoke with my professor to see what equipment was at my disposal for the fitness tests.
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I learned that I wanted to do more with this project than I really had time for. My professor suggested waiting towards the end of the semester once the class went through the majority of the fitness tests before choosing and conducting them, so that gave me a much shorter period of time than I expected to get my planned tasks done. Because of this I learned to be flexible with timelines different than my own but still manage to complete most of my goals with this project. I learned that I may need to set boundaries for myself on how much work I should put into something since I have noticed from previous honors projects that I tend to do more than necessary for a project or put in more hours than I should as a student with many responsibilities. One thing I did not do with this project that I would want to do in the future with a personal training client would be to create a graph per fitness test of where the client is and a comparison marker of a target goal or where the average or the above-average person of the same age and gender scores.