Sept. 21, 2010
KANSAS CITY, Kan. - Baylor University Athletics recently agreed to a multi-year partnership with Career Athletes to become the seventh school partner in the Big 12 Conference.
The partnership between Career Athletes and the Baylor athletic department provides a national representation of unique networking opportunities and career development resources for current and alumni athletes. It also provides Baylor student-athletes the ability to connect with employers who want to hire hard working, competitive, and team oriented individuals.
"We are excited about the unique benefits and opportunities Career Athletes will provide for our alumni and student athletes at Baylor University," said Walter Abercrombie, Associate AD/Executive Director, "B" Association.
"Student-athletes possess many of the skills and characteristics companies look for in their employees. However, the job market is extremely competitive and student athletes need an edge, something to set them apart. Career Athletes offers them the opportunity to obtain the connections and career education that will give them that edge," said Abercrombie.
The Online Baylor Career Athletes Network will provide benefits such as mentoring, professional networking, virtual career coaching and 12 years of best practices from the leading and largest career services organization assisting athletes, athletic departments and campus career centers.
"Career Athletes does a great job of incorporating all the tools needed for our student-athletes to transition into life after sports," said Bart Byrd, Associate Athletic Director for Student-Athlete Services.
Tierra Barber, Director of Student-Athlete Development said, "By adding Career Athletes to our services, we hope to connect our current and former student-athletes to promising opportunities. This will strengthen our career development program and equip our student-athletes with tools necessary for success after graduating."
The Baylor Career Athletes Network consists of current and alumni athletes from the institution as well as local, regional and national employers all managed and monitored by Career Athletes at its home office in the Kansas City area.
Individual members of Career Athletes are also able to network with more than 70,000 community members from across the nation while having access to more than 5,000 career opportunities exclusive to www.careerathletes.com.
Associate Director of Career Services at Baylor University, Kevin Nall said "Student athletes possess many of the skills that employers value in a job applicant, they just don't know how to market those skills. That is where we believe that Career Athletes can help our students.
"Through an intentional partnership, we believe we can offer our students an outstanding array of services. We believe that partnering with someone like Career Athletes will also send our students strong messages that we are serious about helping them prepare for their lives after their playing days are over," said Nall.
Career Athletes also provides Baylor Athletics the unique ability to enhance fundraising and recruiting efforts while offering a revenue share program that allows the university to receive additional monetary resources.
"We are pleased to assist Baylor Athletics with its commitment toward career development of athletes and it is great to see the support across campus. It is also just as important to recognize the program's culture of achievement in community service, academic performance and athletic success," said DJ Washington, Vice President, Career Education and Training for Career Athletes.
Baylor University is no stranger to success as indicated by additional achievements during the 2009-2010 academic year:
• Set a school record by placing 254 student-athletes on the Fall 2009 Big 12 Commissioner's Honor Roll.
• Set a school record by placing 238 student-athletes on the Spring 2010 Big 12 Commissioner's Honor Roll.
• Set a school record by placing a total of 492 student-athletes on the 2009-2010 Big 12 Commissioner's Honor Roll.
• For the 2nd straight year Baylor had over 100 student-athletes selected to Academic All-Big 12 teams with 105 during 2009-2010.
• Set a school record with 5 teams leading the Academic All-Big 12 selections during 2009-2010 (Baseball, Softball, Women's Cross Country, Men's Tennis and Women's Tennis).
• 54.3% of student-athletes had at least a 3.0 term GPA for the Fall of 2009.
• 54.1% of student-athletes had at least a 3.0 term GPA for the Spring of 2010.
• 38 student-athletes had a perfect 4.0 GPA in the Fall of 2009.
• 42 student-athletes had a perfect 4.0 GPA in the Spring of 2010.
• During 2009-2010, 100 student-athletes graduated with a Bachelor's degree and 8 student-athletes with a Master's degree.
• Baylor has led the Big 12 for the last 4 out of the last 5 years in Graduation Success Rate.
• Baylor has led the Big 12 five times in student-athlete graduation rate.
• 175 student-athletes were named to the Dean's list during 2009-2010.
• 13 of 16 teams have a cumulative grade-point average above a 3.0.
• The cumulative grade point average for all 16 teams is a 3.01.
Baylor student-athletes were also involved in several community service projects the previous school year. Baylor's Student Athlete Advisory Committee has won Most Pounds of food collected for the college division for the Waco area Food for Families Food Drive 2 years in a row. Student-athletes also participate in Santa's Workshop annually - an event to provide an uplifting Christmas experience for children from the Waco community. The children receive a gift and visit with good ol' Saint Nick and range in age from 3-5. For many of them, this will be the only gift that they receive for Christmas. Student-Athletes also host an event called Little Wranglers where athletes play with children who are cancer survivors at home baseball/softball games. They also hold sports clinics each January for the athletes of Special Olympics in the Waco area. Other projects include assisting with supper sports camp at Woodway Family Center and other random speaking engagements at area schools.
For more information on Career Athletes and to sign up for your FREE account, please visit: www.careerathletes.com
