Last Thursday night during the Denver Broncos and the Baltimore Ravens game, pro football fans cringed as The Blind Side’s inspiration, Michael Oher, injured his ankle. Limping off to the sideline, Michael was treated by athletic trainers before receiving additional medical attention after the game.
According to the U.S. Labor Statistics, demand for athletic trainers and other sports medicine careers like physical therapy, is expected to increase by 30% in the next ten years.
To better prepare students in this rapidly growing field, the Bob Jones’ Medical Academy is adding a new internship rotation to give students up close participation in athletic training.
Teaming up with the Bob Jones’ athletic trainers from the Huntsville Hospital Sports Center, Michael Dye and Tyann Thomson, Medical Academy students now have the opportunity to help and shadow certified athletic trainers on the field and court for the upcoming sporting seasons.
“Our hope is to find a few students that are interested enough to be dedicated to learning about athletic training and assisting us with covering sports here at Bob Jones High School…Nothing would make us more proud than to see students here at Bob Jones that we have had an influence on and become successful in athletic training or any other healthcare field,” describes Michael Dye.
Interns, trained in first aid and CPR, will practice their emergency response and interpersonal skills while tending to bloody noses and sprained ankles on the field.
” [The interns] get to see real life experiences they can’t get out of a text book,” comments Mrs. Jordan, the Health Science Internship teacher.
Cassidy McCloy, an aspiring physical therapist and Health Science Intern, is excited to start her work on the field, “I know that I want to be involved in sports when I go into physical therapy, and I want to see what my interests are.”
