Editor’s note:

The following is part two in a five-part series about student-athletes’ lives after their careers as Cyclones.

Part one looked at how life changes after their final season.

Part two highlights the balance struck between athletic and academic work, preparing them for the rest of their lives.

Part three profiles athletes with hopes of professional or Olympic careers.

Part four examines the differences for those headed into the workplace, and takes a look at former athletes who have already made the jump.

Finally, part five will reveal our student-athletes’ feelings about their lives after Iowa State.

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From the moment they arrive in Ames, student-athletes have a support system in place that is like no other on the ISU campus.

The coaches for each of Iowa State’s 13 programs become the primary caretakers for the athletes as soon as they set foot on campus. They begin learning before they even set foot in a classroom and they are taught things even more important than wins and losses.

“I probably talk to our team just as much about the importance of doing things right and how it relates to things that take place off the field, than I do winning and losing the football game,” ISU football coach Paul Rhoads said. “A lot of the lessons that we try to teach are not just X and O football based. There are lessons in life that are built into everything.”

Rhoads said that teaching his players non-football lessons was a “huge part” of his job, and that things like trust and accountability not only help them succeed on the field, but in later aspects of life, too.

The coaches get most of their teaching done during the offseason, be it in practices or in their office.

More often than not, when a player steps into his finely furnished office in the Jacobson Athletic Building, Rhoads transforms from a coach into a mentor and a father figure, he said.

“I’ve had a lot more conversations [in the offseason] with people about life outside of football than I have anything related to a route or a coverage,” Rhoads said. “I tie it all together, but it’s the stuff off the field that I work hard to sell and make an impact on.”

However, there are important lessons to be taught on the field, too.

Obviously, the coaches’ No. 1 goal is to win and be successful, and those things come from on-field preparation and planning. It is a challenge, then, for them to balance their time in coaching and being a mentor.

ISU volleyball coach Christy Johnson-Lynch said she expects her players to work hard and practice hard each day, no matter what has happened leading up to it.

“Every second that we’re together in practice, we’re trying to work as hard as we can, so we talk a lot about hard work and discipline,” Johnson-Lynch said.

She said that if her players can work through adversity, injuries or stress, they’ll be better prepared to deal with those things down the road.

“That’s a really good lesson to learn for life and prepares you to go out in the real world where you have to work hard every day and perform when there’s pressure,” Johnson-Lynch said.

Not only do student-athletes have their coaches and mentors within their own teams, but the ISU athletic department’s Challenging Athletes Minds for Personal Success (CHAMPS) and life skills programs also are in place to help ISU athletes be as successful as possible, be it on the field, in the classroom or anywhere else.

“We want to give them as much information as possible, so at the end of the day it’s about informed decision-making,” said Jaime Hurst, the Life Skills coordinator for the athletic department. “We’re not naive to think they won’t be put in those situations, we just want to make sure we give them as much information as possible so they make good decisions.”

Hurst, who oversees the CHAMPS program, said much of what her program does teaches student-athletes how to balance their time between school and their sport. Many programs are associated with the importance of focusing on school while allotting time for practice, workouts and traveling to games.

Hurst spends a lot of one-on-one time with students, depending on each students’ needs. The amount of time she spends with them increases later in their careers as they prepare to move on from college life.

Part of the process includes helping ISU seniors put together resumes for them to send out. Hurst said the athletes list on these resumes their “transferable skills,” such as leadership, teamwork and dedication.

“Companies want all of these things, and we exhibit them every day in what we do as student-athletes,” Hurst said.

Sometimes, Hurst said, putting everything the student-athletes have learned down on paper can be the hardest part.

One size won’t fit everyone

Each student-athlete moves through the system differently.

What they learn and how they learn it varies on a case-to-case basis, and there’s no such thing as a “one-size-fits-all” method to balancing the academic and athletic workloads.

Sometimes, it’s incredibly stressful and leads to poor performance on the field or in the classroom.

Their lives are different.

Every day — usually from the minute they wake up — their days are planned and each minute is utilized. They get benefits and rewards, they’re looked up to — if only because they’re taller than the average 18-to-22 year old — and most of them go to school for free.

But these student-athletes are still maturing, and if they’re not careful, the workload can be too much.

The social aspects of college life add even more for them to balance on their already overloaded minds and bodies.

Kaylee Manns said, though, that without some resemblance of a social life, a student-athlete may have even more trouble.

“It’s such a balancing act, and you need your social life, too,” said Manns, a senior leaving the ISU volleyball program. “You can’t just do school. I mean, I personally can’t just do school and sports. I’d go crazy.”

However, as all of the 466 student-athletes are different, it shouldn’t come as a surprise that they don’t all agree on how they should spend their time outside of class and practice.

“You can’t have all three [athletics, academics and a social life] being an athlete,” said Elise Reid, a four-year member of the ISU soccer team. “You pick two and you’re good at those two, because if you try to do all three, you’re not going to be good at any of them.”

The lessons the student-athletes learn from the challenges of being busy for almost all of their waking hours are worth the struggle, most say.

Their coaches and academic support staff work hard to provide an opportunity to grow, learn and prepare for what lies ahead of them after they leave.

Sometimes, though, it is the personal decisions that determine their level of success.

“In my junior year and senior year, I realized that football’s not going to be forever, so I really need to make the effort to do well in school,” said Fred Garrin, a senior in interdisciplinary studies and a former member of the ISU football team. “I really set aside study hours that I was really going to be productive and pay attention. [Our football advisers] do that for us as student-athletes, but you’ve got to have a responsibility and independence to do it on your own.

“When you take the personal responsibility, at the end is when, I think, things start to come together and you can manage the demands of football and school.”

The things they’ve learned have gotten them through school, and those skills will get them through the challenges awaiting them outside the ISU campus and Ames.