<p>Is majoring in sports sciences different in specifically majoring in athletic training or sports administration? I'm currently not sure about this. I want to be an athletic trainer to a college team, but I don't want to limit myself by declaring to major in AT as undergrad. I want to broaden my horizon with a major of sports sciences as undergrad and get my masters for athletic training (or is that even a possibility). Can anyone give me info/opinions on how to be an athletic trainer, yet have a wide array of experiences (Sports medicine, administration, coaching, exercise and sports science) as an undergrad? I'm just curious because this what most likely I want to go.</p>
<p>Isn't sports administration like the kind of stuff where you negotiate contracts for athletes and represent them and stuff like that? And athletic training is literally what it is, you train athletes. But I'm not sure what anything else is.</p>
<p>weedingout, you want to be an athletic trainer but you don't want to major in athletic training?... that's interesting.</p>
<p>Some schoools that do not offer a specific major in "athletic training" let students (who major in sports admin, exercise science, physical therapy, etc) join the athletic training/medical staff, travel with the teams, and get experience in AT that way. </p>
<p>And yes, their is such a thing as a Masters in Athletic Training (for example, here's the Texas Tech MAT website: <a href="http://www.ttuhsc.edu/sah/mat/%5B/url%5D">http://www.ttuhsc.edu/sah/mat/</a> )</p>
<p>I will be majoring in Athletic Training next year (although technically the program doesn't start until I'm a soph). I looked at some schools that do not offer "Athletic Training" as a major, but they instead offer an "Exercise Science" major that has a wider array of opportunities--usually combined w/ a pre-physical therapy or sports management program. Technically, you can become an athletic trainer as long as you pass the Certification Test, but this usually requires 2-3 years of focusing on the Athletic Training courses.
Yes, there are Masters (even Doctorate) programs in Athletic Training available, some of these however require that you have a 4-year undergrad degree in "Athletic Training". Not all require this though.
Check out <a href="http://www.jrc-at.org/html/accredited_programs.html%5B/url%5D">http://www.jrc-at.org/html/accredited_programs.html</a> or <a href="http://www.nata.org/education/index.htm%5B/url%5D">http://www.nata.org/education/index.htm</a> for information on degrees at the undergrad level and further.</p>
<p>Thank you everyone for your responses. It surely helped. I asked this since I read an interview from Daniel Barton, an athletic training major from UNH:</p>
<p>
[quote]
Sport studies encompasses a bunch of different things: sports marketing, sports management, coaching, journalism, sports psychology, scouting, all the realms of sports. Usually during your first and second years, you take a sampling of classes in all those to get a basic understanding of each category.</p>
<p>I felt that it was important for me to double major. If I just go for athletic training, I can only be an athletic trainer. But with a double major in sport studies, I will be able to understand what the coach's role is, what the athletic director's role is, what everyone's role is. By understanding the roles of the collective group, I can be better at my profession.
[/quote]
</p>
<p>The bolded part is what worries me. I want to be an athletic trainer, yet I don't want to limit myself once I get out of undergraduate study (I want to hold a secure wide array of experience just in case I need a job).</p>
<p>I think its good that you don't want to limit yourself... IMHO it seems like someone in your situation should 1) Double major (like the guy you quoted), or 2) Major in sports studies/physical therapy/exercise science and join the AT staff at your university. </p>
<p>There is also this tidbit from Marquette University:
"Athletic training is a great foundation for medical school or the doctoral physical therapy program, and many of our graduates go on to advanced degrees. But you'll also have great flexibility to begin working in your favorite area of this field right away, whether it's tending to high school or college student athletes, setting up your own clinic for athletic training, or managing the medical care of amateur and professional sports teams across the country."</p>
<p>At University of Michigan, all the majors you mentioned fall under the school of Kinesiology, so you could probably just take a wide array of classes within the school and get the education you're looking for.</p>