As student affairs practitioners, we often emphasize holistic development and identity exploration as central tenets of student success. For student-athletes, whose identities are often deeply tied to their athletic ability or sport and the community that comes with it, a season-ending injury can disrupt aspects of their life beyond just their physical recovery. Challenges to their mental health, sense of identity, and academic engagement can all occur. This case explores how a student affairs professional navigates cross-campus collaboration to support a student-athlete through such an unexpected shift.

Keywords: Mental Health, Identity Beyond Sport, Cross-Campus Collaboration, and Holistic Student Support

Primary Characters

Taylor (she/her)- Assistant Director for Student-Athlete Development at Blue Ridge University. She is a student affairs professional who collaborates with academic services, coaches, and counseling to promote holistic student support.

Maya (she/her) – A junior student-athlete majoring in psychology and a member of Blue Ridge University’s Division 1 rowing team. Known for their leadership and dedication, Maya has built much of her identity and social circle around rowing. Following a major shoulder injury during a spring practice, she is facing at least a year-long recovery process and uncertainty about her athletic future.

Coach Reynolds (he/him) – The head coach of the rowing team. A former collegiate athlete himself, he is supportive but primarily focused on Maya’s injury rehabilitation timeline and maintaining team performance.

Avery (she/her) – A learning specialist in the Student-Athlete Academic Services Office. She notices Maya’s declining academic engagement and missed tutoring sessions.

Context

Being a rower at a Division 1 school is a lifestyle. Student-athletes often get up before sunrise for practice, attend training, workouts, supplemental practices throughout the day, and travel for competitions, all while having to balance their academic schedules. Rowing being a team sport means that teammates often form strong connections with one another and develop a strong sense of collective identity as a team.

At Blue Ridge University, a large, public D1 institution in the south, student-athletes receive academic, athletic, and wellness support through multiple offices, including the Athletic Department, Office of Student-Athlete Development, Student-Athlete Academic Services, and Counseling and Psychological Services (CAPS). Collaboration across units often depends on individual relationships rather than formal communication networks and structures. Coaches are encouraged to refer students for support, but sometimes unintentionally overlook personal development challenges athletes face by being so focused on athletic performance.

Case

Maya has been rowing since high school and quickly emerged as a leader on her college team. Her schedule consists of early morning practices, class, afternoon lifts, and academic support sessions coordinated through Student-Athlete Academic Services. Her closest friends are her teammates, and her academic interests center on sport psychology specifically involving team dynamics and performance.

During a spring practice in her junior year, Maya suffers a severe shoulder injury that requires surgery and rehab. Her medical team projects a recovery period of at least nine months, ending her season and most likely her collegiate rowing career.

Initially, Maya tries to stay positive. She continues to attend team meetings and physical therapy sessions and is confident she will be able to get back into competition-ready condition in time to compete before the end of her senior season. But as weeks pass, she begins skipping rehab, stops showing up to academic support appointments, and stops hanging out with friends from her team.

Avery, her learning specialist, notices that Maya has missed two tutoring sessions in a row and had noticed before the missed appointments that Maya seemed disengaged from classes she excelled in before her injury. Avery had been planning to discuss this with Maya, but in addition to the missed appointments, Maya is not responding to Avery’s outreach efforts.

Avery reaches out to Taylor, who then sets up a check-in meeting with Maya in which she admits she is struggling. The injury has changed how she sees herself on campus. Without rowing, Maya feels disconnected and not sure of where she fits in. “My whole life on campus was built around rowing. I don’t know how to structure my time and my life without the team at the center.”  Taylor encourages Maya to seek help from CAPS, but Maya seems uncertain and expresses not wanting to draw extra attention to herself.  “I just want to push through the rest of the semester,” she says.

Taylor asks Maya about her coach and how he has been supporting her. Maya shares that Coach Reynolds initially was consistent about checking in with her, but the focus was mainly on her recovery and discussion about when she might be ready to return to the team. “He always responds when I reach out, but he isn’t really checking in on me like maybe I thought he would. He just seems to want medical and rehab updates from me when I stop by.”

Taylor begins to sense a deeper issue developing. Maya is withdrawing from academic and athletics spaces, is reluctant to access mental health resources and has been transparent with the fact that she’s struggling.

As the semester goes on, Maya’s engagement continued to decline. Her academic performance begins to slip, and she starts expressing uncertainty to Taylor about her future at the university. Maya feels caught between hoping to recover in time to compete and her fear that her connection to rowing might be over. “I feel lost right now,” Maya confesses. “I am not sure who I am if I’m not part of the rowing team anymore.”

Taylor is strategizing on how to best coordinate support for Maya in a way that integrates athletics, academics, and student development. She must consider how to help Maya reframe her sense of identity while maintaining collaboration and communication with the support network surrounding her.

Discussion Questions

1. What student development or identity theories might help explain Maya’s experience and inform Taylor’s approach?
2. How can Taylor collaborate across offices to help support Maya and help her re-engage on campus?
3. What are some possible ways of building a culture of help-seeking within high-performance student communities, such as athletes?
4. How might this case inform strategies for proactive student-athlete support before crises, like injury, occur?
5. In what ways can professional development and cross-campus training help coaches and athletics staff recognize the psychological and identity-related impacts of injury, and how might this knowledge shift the culture of support within athletics departments?

Author Biographies

Bess Prim (she/her) – Bess is a second-year graduate student in the Clemson University Master of Counselor Education, Student Affairs program. She serves as the Tutoring Program Graduate Assistant in the Academic Success Center as well as the Graduate Intern for Student-Athlete Development in the Clemson Athletics Department. Bess was a Division II athlete at Rollins College until she graduated in 2023, and she is passionate about student-athlete development beyond sport.

Caroline Waddell (she/her) – Caroline is a second-year graduate student in the Clemson University Master of Counselor Education, Student Affairs program. She serves as the Graduate Assistant for Bridge to Clemson and Transfer Programs. Prior to attending Clemson, Caroline graduated from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill in the Summer of 2022 and is passionate about program evaluation and assessment, as well as helping students feel a sense of belonging.