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UNCG Greensboro utilizes Game Plan across their entire student-athlete development and academic departments. Results have been outstanding and even led the department to host their 2nd “Game Plan Day” in November. How does Game Plan improve UNCG’s student-athlete development efforts? Read below for a Q/A session with Cole Henderson, Coordinator of Spartan Academic Support Services.
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Before using Game Plan, it was not easy for us to get the same information to a population of student-athletes at the same time. We would host workshops, but we would still run into the problem of absences. Also, we did not have a system of tracking our student-athletes progress when it came to the completion of Life Skills exercises, or S-A development events/activities.
Game Plan has been a one-stop shop for our student-athletes. This platform allows our student-athletes to receive valuable information on their own time. During the beginning of the year, the students are introduced to the Game Plan platform by completing our custom course relating to UNCG’s student-athlete handbook. Not only does this save time and resources to get the materials to the student-athletes, but by logging on to Game Plan to complete the assignment, it shows the student-athletes that this platform will be important to their success here on campus.
I have shown Game Plan to prospective student-athletes and their parents. It’s a great recruiting tool as parents like to know that their child will be utilizing a platform that aids in their development as a young adult. With Game Plan allowing each university to build custom recruiting pages, it acts as a virtual brochure for our department.
The best feature we utilize on Game Plan is the ability to build custom courses. When we build custom courses, we can tailor information that directly relates to a UNCG student-athlete. At the very beginning of the year, we were able to create a course that allowed the student-athlete to test their knowledge of our student-athlete handbook. We were able to get 100% completion of the course!
At the very beginning of the year, we were able to create a course that allowed the student-athlete to test their knowledge of our student-athlete handbook. We were able to get 100% completion of the course, which equates to all 240 student-athletes viewing and comprehending the information in the student-athlete handbook.
We saw a few of our student-athletes accept internships through the career marketplace feature. Seeing this play out further supports that Game Plan does care about a student-athletes life after graduation. One of our women’s basketball players accepted an internship with the Carolina Cobras, an experience that can’t be taken away.
Game Plan has made the student-athletes and support staff lives easier. As an academic coach for two teams, sometimes I don’t get to see my upperclassmen as much as the freshmen, due to weekly meetings and simply seeing the freshman around the academic center more frequently. Game Plan allows me to introduce the lessons and information to the student-athletes in a very easy way.
UNC Greensboro Athletics understands the importance of a well-rounded student-athlete experience. As part of their strategic plan, The Spartan Way, UNCG has outlined six guiding principles as the foundation for daily decisions: student-athlete well-being, teamwork, responsibility, integrity, development, and excellence (or, S.T.R.I.D.E).
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