July 19, 2010
Kansas City, KS - Career Athletes, an online career community network, has announced a partnership with Idaho State University Athletics to provide a national representation of unique networking opportunities and career development resources for current and alumni athletes. Idaho State University becomes the second Big Sky Conference school to partner with Career Athletes, joining Weber State.
Quinton Freeman, Academic Advisor/CHAMPS Life Skills Coordinator at Idaho State University, said, "Idaho State Athletics is very excited about our partnership with Career Athletes. As we continue to evolve, we constantly strive to find avenues to assist our current and former student-athletes with opportunities to learn, grow, and promote themselves in a positive manner. Partnering with Career Athletes will give us a good platform to help them with this along with creating a bridge from current student-athletes to former student-athletes, and back to their athletic department. The aspect of building relationships on all of these levels is very exciting and beneficial for all Bengals!"
Career Athletes 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. The Idaho State University "Community 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 over 65,000 former college athletes from across the nation while having access to over 5,000 career opportunities exclusive to www.careerathletes.com. Career Athletes also provides Idaho State 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.
DJ Washington at Career Athletes explains that beyond an athletic department's initiative assisting with career opportunities and educational resources, it also helps when there is already a foundation on campus toward academic success. "We are pleased to assist Idaho State Athletics with its commitment toward career development of athletes, but it is also just as important to recognize the program's culture of achievement in community service, academic performance and athletic success," shared Washington, Vice President, Career Education and Training. Idaho State is no stranger to success as indicated by additional achievements during the 2009-2010 school year:
• 105 student-athletes earned Big Sky All-Academic and nine more earned Pacific Coast Softball Conference All-Academic
• Punter Jon Vanderwielen was named First Team All-American
• Women's soccer advanced to the Big Sky Conference Championship game
• Women's soccer player Annamarie Hofstetter broke the school and conference assist record and was named CoSIDA/ESPN The Magazine First Team Academic All-American
• Track student-athlete Cassie Merkeley earned All-American status in the heptathlon
• Softball's Taylor Marchione was named Co-Pitcher of the Year and Co-Player of the Year in the Mountain Division of the Pacific Coast Softball Conference
• Women's Basketball tied for second place in the Big Sky Conference
