College of Saint Mary

Bio

She once graced the soccer field in a College of Saint Mary jersey.

Now, Chandlyr Sullivan enters the field of play for a different reason: to care for injured Flames athletes.

A 2020 CSM graduate, Sullivan is the school's full-time Head Athletic Trainer. She is in charge of Flames athletes' overall well-being: from evaluating their conditions to designing exercise and nutrition plans to diagnosing and treating injuries to providing rehabilitation services.

She's the friendly face that guides CSM athletes through the challenging and often emotional process of an injury.

"It's fun to be back,'' Sullivan said. "I've had a lot of people vouching for me. I felt called to help people, and this was my way to serve others.''

Sullivan attended school in the Okoboji Community School District in northwest Iowa through the fourth grade, when she moved with her family to Glenwood in southwest Iowa. She was heavily involved in activities at Glenwood, participating in volleyball, soccer, marching band, drum line, cheerleading, swimming, dance team and tennis at various points of her youth.

Early in her college career, Sullivan had changed her major to education. Then she tore her ACL during her sophomore year of college, requiring lengthy periods of physical therapy.

"I remember asking my physical therapist all these questions, and she said, 'What's your major again?' I was like, 'education,' and she said, 'why?' I said, 'great point.'

"A couple days later, I changed my major to kinesiology.''

Sullivan said her physically challenging athletic career allows her to relate well to the injuries her College of Saint Mary athletes encounter.

"Probably 80 percent of the people that come in injured, I'm like, 'Oh, I can totally understand what you're talking about,''' she said. "The concussions, the knee pain, the ankle sprains, literally everything. I'm like, 'Yep, I've been there.'''

Sullivan said another benefit of her job is building relationships with her athletes and coaches. She loves that aspect of it.

Having navigated the kinesiology program at CSM, she's able to pass on some of that experience to her athletes.

"They'll be like, 'Oh, did you have to do this or this in class?' I'll say, 'Yes, this is how I went about it.' I've had a lot of ladies ask me recently about AT (athletic training) school or PT (physical therapy) school, or how to go about internships. So I think because I'm so closely removed from that stuff, it's kind of fresh in my mind still and I can help them navigate through it.''

Sullivan spends the majority of her days bouncing between practices and games and her training room. There are occasions, however, when all of her schooling and expertise take a back seat and she's simply a trusted confidant to young women.

"I love when the ladies have free time,'' she said. "I have a chair in my office and they just come in and sit down. I ask if they need anything and they're just like, 'No, I just came to talk.' It's fun just kind of being a safe place for them to come in. They are all a lot of fun.''