Two cross-country and track runners balance schoolwork, clinicals, athletics
Student athletes may be blessed with the playing ability to get them into college, but they also carry the burden of having to balance schoolwork with games, practices and other sports-related tasks.
For Janel Campbell and Heather Owens, runners on the women’s cross-country and track team, that burden is weighed down further with the addition of clinicals.
Campbell, a junior in nursing, and Owens, a senior in radiology, have run on the cross-country and track team their entire collegiate careers, but this season has both runners finding time on their own to run without the team due to their demanding schedules.
Campbell admits balancing school, practice and clinicals is a tough task, but she said the hard work and time put in makes it more worth it in the end.
“I think the reason we do it is because it’s so difficult,” Owens said. “It’s hard for us. It’s hard for everybody, but it’s the success that makes it worth doing.”
Early beginnings
Campbell started running at the young age of six, participating in fun runs with her dad and began running competitively in sixth grade. It was not until her freshman year in high school that she realized she wanted to run competitively past secondary school.
“It was something I really enjoyed and I knew that if I could get a scholarship in college, it would help me,” Campbell said. “I made it to the state cross-country meet a couple of times [in high school], and my senior year I also made the track state meet.”
Campbell credits her athletic pedigree to her parents, who were both college swimmers. The two of them always pushed her to excel in sports, and also served as her main source of motivation.
Owens also started running competitively in junior high, citing two coaches throughout grade school pushing her toward her love of running.
“I started in sixth grade physical education (class),” Owens said. “I had a really good coach who loved running and she pushed me to get involved.
My junior year in high school, I had a new coach come in from Harding University in Arkansas. She really pushed me to work hard and improved my running ability. She tried hard to drill in my head that I was good and needed to try and run in college.”
Owens almost did not get the chance to run in college. The weekend before her state track meet her senior year, an accident led to knee surgery and put her on bed rest for a month.
“I wasn’t sure if I would even be able to walk,” Owens said. “The infection was so bad, they thought they were going to have to amputate my leg, but it turned out fine.”
Running in college
Since joining the women’s cross-country and track program, Campbell and Owens have each played vital parts on the team.
Owens was a 2011 LSC Commissioner’s Honor Roll recipient and helped the team on its way to its fourth consecutive LSC conference title, its first South Central Regional title and an 11th place finish at nationals.
Campbell has also had a successful career, making the United States Track & Field and Cross-Country Coaches Association’s Division II-All Academic team in 2010, the USTFCCCA All-South Central Region team, the All-Lone Star Conference team, the LSC All-Academic team and the LSC Commissioner’s Honor Roll in 2011. Campbell made the Commissioner’s Honor Roll in 2012 as well.
Despite all the personal bests and team championships they have helped win, both runners said what is more important is their all-academic honors.
“I think it’s a huge accomplishment, because first and foremost, we are students before we are athletes,” Campbell said. “That’s why I’m in college. I wouldn’t be here if I didn’t want a degree.”
Choosing their path
Although Campbell and Owens may have discovered their love of running early in life, their specific career paths did not come to them as easily.
Campbell said she always wanted to do something in the medical field after taking an anatomy class in high school, but she never knew what direction to go in until consulting a few friends.
“I know a lot of people that are nurses,” she said. “I’ve heard their stories and how rewarding the career is, and I thought that was amazing. That’s what got me into nursing.”
Owens found herself on the path to becoming a radiological technician the summer after her high school graduation.
“I didn’t want to graduate high school and come to college undecided,” she said. “I knew I wanted to do something in the medical field, but I didn’t want to do the actual surgery part.”
Owens said she spent that summer shadowing a local radiologist to see if it was something she would be interested in, and everything took off from there.
“It was never something that I started off wanting to do,” she said. “It sort of found me and grew on me. Radiology just seemed to fit me more.”
Balancing school, practice
Although both girls are taking clinicals, the tasks involved with each concentration differ. Nonetheless, the strain of balancing work and school still plays a heavy role in the girls’ lives.
“It’s hard,” Owens said. “You go to clinicals 34 hours-a-week and at the end of the day you come home and it’s like getting off from a full-time job. You don’t want to do anything else but relax and chill the rest of the night, but you have classes to attend.”
While Owens’ clinicals at Kell Regional Hospital are held during the day, Campbell’s alternate between day and night shifts at the Texas State
Hospital and United Regional depending on the day.
While some may believe that Campbell drew the short-end-of-the-straw having to work at night, there are disadvantages to Owens’ schedule too.
“I think for Heather it’s different, because she has all online classes,” Campbell said. “She doesn’t have to sit through a lecture, but she also doesn’t have anyone pushing her to get her school work done. It’s hard for me, but I get Thursdays and Fridays off, but when I have a 12-hour shift on Wednesday night, my Thursday is gone because I’m sleeping most of the day.”
Along with balancing schoolwork, keeping team practice in the mix has proven to be difficult for the two runners. Most of the time, Campbell finds herself having to run on her own.
“There are those days that we can’t practice with the team,” she said. “I have class from 3-6 p.m. on Mondays, and practice starts at three. Last semester I was able to practice with the team just about everyday, so I knew this semester was going to be a challenge. Mentally, I was scared about how it would affect my times or when I would be able to do hard workouts.”
Luckily, Campbell said that coach Koby Styles has accommodated her schedule and has taken time out of his own to run hard workouts with her when she’s available.
“That’s helped push me,” Campbell said. “I’m able to still run my times, but if I hadn’t had somebody on the track with me, I don’t know if things would be the way they are.”
Owens, on the other hand, is able to practice with the team three to four times a week, but has to make up the remaining practices on her own.
“Last semester, (running on my own) was really difficult, but you get used to it and adjust,” she said. “It’s something you struggle with, but it’s been a lot easier this semester than last semester, since track is more individual and what you put into it than cross-country is.”
Despite the challenges associated with balancing school with athletics, both girls are grateful for the experiences they’ve gained from it.
“I think it’s made college so much easier, because you come in, and you already have a group that you belong with,” Campbell said. “It’s something you love, and you can share that with other people. My greatest friends are my teammates. I think even the hard days with running when you doubt yourself and your ability, just having other people with you makes it so much easier.”
“I love it,” Owens said. “I’d definitely do it again.”