Camp Reflection

            Once I had learned that an EDGE project is a requirement for graduation at SUU, I began to ponder at the possibilities of what I could do. Initially, I wanted to shadow a local physician since I was on a pre-med track and thought this could be a beneficial experience for me. Although, I later changed my mind and wanted to become a physician’s assistant and no longer thought that was a good idea. Then once the beginning of summer came around and I began preparing for the upcoming season, I remembered how we host multiple high school football camps at the university. My heart has been torn between deciding to pursue graduate school or becoming a coach in the game that I love. This is why I chose to help with the camp to see if it could aide in my decision for my future.

            Having decided this, I got in touch with our defensive line coach at SUU since he is the one who coordinates the full team camps. When meeting with him, we were able to work out a schedule of what times I could help and run scrimmages. After meeting with him, I had to get prepared to running certain aspects of the camp mentally and I needed a few materials such as a whistle. The goal of all of this was to obtain a better grasp of what career field I want to head into. There are pros and cons to both and I felt if I was able to gain experience in the field of coaching that I would gain a better understanding of it all.

            At the conclusion of the camp, I felt that I had fallen more deeply in love with the game of football since I was able to share the knowledge I had gained over the years with kids who were trying to become better players. I have been playing football for over 14 years now, so I have learned a thing or two about the game and wanted to share that with others. Also, I was able to learn from some mistakes that I did in high school and try to guide those to steer away from these mistakes. To be able to share this information, I had to use vocal skills and display in confidence in what I was saying so they understood that I thought it was important. During my project a skill I had lacked was being a vocal leader, and through running the scrimmages and helping coach I think that has improved.

            My EDGE project was able to help me gain insights about how different people need to be lead and how people will respond to various forms of leadership. In my opinion, for someone to be a leader they need to have the respect of others or else no one will listen to them. So, I saw the teams that were ran by more proper coach and peer leadership had more success in the camp that other teams that may had been more talented. Leadership can help build unity and trust in a team and this is why I think they found more success.

            In conclusion, I’m grateful for having had this opportunity to build my leadership skills and focus my career path all in one experience. I believe SUU has implemented this type of project so that students can go out into the community and be able to work with others. There is only so much that can be learned in a classroom setting, and in life there are going to be times that you have to be proactive to have success. These are some of the reasons SUU has implemented a project like this into the university curriculum. Helping with the camps this summer was fun and something I will try to be involved in more moving into the future.