By: Ian Gillen
Staff Reporter
Any student at Roanoke College lives a busy, complicated, and hardworking life. Student athletes at RC live with these same challenges and take them one step further, taking on added responsibilities. These responsibilities look like daily practices, early alarms, and weekly games adding up to a hectic life.
Emily Hecht, junior, is a volleyball player here at Roanoke. She has described her life as a student athlete as “demanding, complicated, and time consuming.” However, Hecht
loves it. She believes that this experience is “something that makes me a better person”. The life of a student athlete is one that can restrict the student, but, as seen through Hecht, is a life that can still be filled with many extra activities.
Throughout her busy days and weeks of games and practices she has still been able to help found the club tennis team, be a maroon ambassador, be recently nominated president of the communications honor society (Lamda Pi Eta), and be a member of the Chi Omega sorority. This all adds up to a hectic schedule that she is able to manage, in part, thanks to the faculty we have here at Roanoke College.
Hecht is very thankful for the professors she has had; she has never had a professor question her or say no when she had to leave for a game, and she has always been met with great help when she needed any help from a professor. Hecht also has said that life as a student athlete has made a much better student, as she has had to plan ahead, and be more aware of her schedule. During the regular season she will perform better in class as a result of this, as her demanding athletic life forces her to study harder and be more aware of her upcoming assignments.
In her few hours a day of free time, Hecht loves eating Commons’ General Tso’s chicken, spending time with her Chi Omega sisters, and taking a trip to Dairy Queen. Through the jumbled planners, early mornings, and late nights it is all worth it for Hecht, as the sense of accomplishment felt while coming together with her teammates after a win makes everything worth it. This life is certainly not an easy one, but it is beloved because of the people we have around us at Roanoke College, and the memories we are able to create with them.
