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drew
June 19, 2019
I am not an athletic trainer.
In 2009, I co-founded a company called NXTsports with my two partners Peter Lawrence and Joel Zuercher. NXT has now grown into the largest event lacrosse event company in the country and is supported by a best in class lacrosse club in the Philadelphia area. In 2015, on the heels of the unfortunate situation at Penn State, we made a decision that prioritized safety. We hired Ellis as our full-time Director of Participant Health and Safety and committed to having an athletic trainer at every practice, clinic, camp, and tournament we managed. NXT has spent over $400,000 on athletic trainers over the past 4 years. They are fully committed to youth sports safety.
I met Ellis during a tournament in 2010. I had a summer lacrosse camp with 200 kids the next week with no athletic trainer on staff. The first day of camp is always a circus and Ellis showed up looking the part and asked the important questions such as, “Where is the emergency action plan? and “Where is the AED?”. Woefully underprepared to deal with any sort of medical situation or questions from parents, Ellis jumped in and became the medical director for the camp. This is nothing out of the ordinary for athletic trainers; it’s what they do.
She earned a bachelors in athletic training from Penn State. She then became as the head athletic trainer at a secondary school outside of Philadelphia for three years before attending Boston University to earn her Masters Degree. At BU, she was a graduate assistant her first year working with BU’s field hockey team. Ellis’ second year she was hired full-time by the University working with the Field Hockey and Men’s Rowing teams. While working collegiately, she saw a number of striking patient cases that inspired her and realized that if they had access to athletic trainers earlier in their careers it might have prevented injury in college. The largest athletic population in the United States is at the youth level. Ironically, this patient panel has little or no access to athletic training services. Her passion for youth sports brought her back to Philadelphia where she spearheaded an early intervention effort.
Ellis is an exceptional athletic trainer.
As NXT grew to over 75 tournaments, camps, and clinics a year, it became challenging to find athletic trainers. Every region of the country had a different solution which proved to be difficult to coordinate.
We built Go4Ellis to simplify the process of finding athletic trainers. We know that athletic trainers are the most appropriate healthcare provider to handle any situation on the field, rink, mat, court and pitch.
We understand that it can be hard to find athletic trainers. We also understand that it can be hard to find per diem work. Go4Ellis brings event operators and athletic trainers together on the mission to keep participants safe.
-Andy Hayes
CEO / Go4Ellis
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