Posted: 02/28/07

Mentor program raises men’s hockey GPA
Getting better grades: the three-prong approach

Colin Vallance | photo editor
cvallance@smcvt.edu

As student-athletes, members of the men’s hockey team are accustomed to excelling on the ice. This past season, with the help of psychology professor Dave Landers and four other faculty mentors, the team turned toward another field in which they worked to excel—the classroom.

Addressing the problem

Dave Landers, St. Michael’s psychology professor and faculty athletics representative, began working on the expanded mentoring program prior to the school year.

Dave Landers joined forces with other faculty mentors to keep the hockey team in academic check this past season. (Photo, Colin Vallance)

“This past summer the provost of the college, Bill Wilson, called some of us together to talk about academic achievement, gender, and to look at how our young men are doing because they are not doing as well as our woman are doing academically," Landers says. "We’ve seen that as a pattern for several years.”

The program uses a three-prong approach for academic success. The pillars of the program are self-assessment, goal setting, and program development, he says. Landers says he chose to pilot the program with the hockey team because he works with them and was able to compile a group of suitable mentors for the team.

Mentors include Mike New, vice president for human resources and goalie judge for the hockey team; Fr. Marcel Rainville, St. Michael’s minister and chaplain of the team; Seth Cole, sports information director and coach of the St. Michael’s baseball team; and Bernard Cieplicki, manager of Ross Sports Center and liaison between the athletic department and admission.

As an avid hockey fan, Landers attends the games and has been mentoring first-year students and transfer players. Collaboration between the faculty, students, coaches, and mentors gives the program the complete package, Landers says.

“These are people who have for the most part, gotten reinforcement for their physical ability, their athletic ability," he says. "All of a sudden, people believe in them, help them believe in themselves, and they see the results. They took their team grade point average and went from a 2.6 to a 2.92.”

Landers says rather than stressing “working harder” as the solution to academic troubles, the three-prong program emphasizes using faculty and staff resources as well as building personal confidence.

“We get very specific," Landers says."Do you need to talk with a professor? Do you need to submit rough drafts? Do you need to go to the writing center? Do you need to get a tutor? As the mentors, we know the system of the college, we can then take you and plug you into what you need to get you from here to here.”

Tending the spirit of the team

Junior forward, Matt Hall studies spanish with Julia Berberan in Durick Library. (Photo, Colin Vallance)

Rainville, says he sees his role of guiding the team spiritually as an important part of shaping students.

“In order to be successful, it is important to tend to the body, spirit, and mind," Rainville says. "The coaches deal with the body, I help with the spirit, and it is the teachers that take care of the mind.”

Aside from meeting with his student-athletes about their academic performance, Rainville also attends the games for support, he says.

“I do a blessing before the games," he says. "It’s good for team spirit and sense of community among the players. There is an important part of the equation missing when this is not also built around the core position of the college, which is to learn.”

Growing up in Vermont, Rainville has lived around hockey his entire life, he says.

“All of us really care for the game, and we care for the guys," he says. "We get to know them and their families really well. I gain respect for the players as they grow. We share jokes and have breakfast and lunch together.”

Senior forward Derek Girouard has been participating in the program and says it is helpful for the first-years more so than the seniors.

“I’d recommend it for the future," he says. "When I was a freshman the mentoring situation was kind of a joke. We were given an older player on the team and were expected to transition to college life with their guidance,” says Girouard.

The team was more excited than usual when they received their grades one week before Christmas while in Europe, practicing and playing games, Girouard says.

“When we were in France it was pretty exciting when we were all finding out our grades," he says. "We all huddled around a computer in an Internet café and compared grades. It’s been a great year academically--the team's GPA jumped up pretty high and I actually got the best grades in my St. Michael’s career.”

Held high on and off the ice

Head coach, Lou DiMasi, says he has been pleased with the results of Landers’ program, not just in terms of academic achievement but also in team morale.

“I see this as a major foundation for the future," he says. "It’s an important building block, in my opinion, for teams to come. Let's face it, people do better when they feel like they are wanted, when they feel like someone cares about them, when they feel as though they belong.”

As a team that relies on receiving ample time on the ice, they are sometimes at the mercy of open rink slots, DiMasi says. Because of this, DiMasi says the hockey team is prone to sub-par academic performance.

“We are up at six a.m., we play sometimes very late at night," DiMasi says. "Our timeline or our times are not conducive toward being successful in many avenues, so we needed to focus on to what do our players need to be successful.”

DiMasi says he holds the program in high regard, and says it was a successful way of bringing team commitment and spirit off the ice and into the classroom.

“I fully suspect that we will absolutely be involved in the future," DiMasi says. "We are very grateful for the effort of Dave Landers and all of those who were mentors for the players, we are truly indebted to them. I think some relationships were bonded that wouldn’t have happened and will be maintained for years to come,” Dimasi says.

Landers is currently working on expanding the program to other athletics teams on campus, he says.The hockey team’s success is evidence that the program works, he says. The men’s baseball team will be next in line for the three-prong approach for academic success.

“I have four faculty members now who have agreed to work with the men’s baseball team," Landers says. "Success is building upon success and it started because the provost said we need to look at academic achievement in general.”