WILMINGTON, Ohio. — For the players in Super Bowl 58, it was the biggest game of their lives. At the same time, for some Wilmington College students, the weekend in Las Vegas was their biggest future career opportunity.
"They want to work in UFC let's get them into UFC... if they don't want to work in college athletics OK, let's go somewhere else," said Alan Ledford, program director of the sports management department at Wilmington College. "Instead of listening to us talk for 45 more minutes about another lecture, we want to get them out as often as we possibly can."
That hands-on experience for 21 students meant working a variety of events at Super Bowl 58.
"It really is an eye opening experience," said Jimmy Mattern, area coordinator for sport sciences at Wilmington College. "It's all about the hands-on experience for the students, taking what they learned in the classroom, putting it into real life and we enjoy it."
These students are studying sports management at Wilmington College. For junior Trinity Vandusen, who is a triple major, she's looking for a career in the finance side of professional sports. Super Bowl weekend was the ultimate networking opportunity for her.
"I may not necessarily be in the stadium, on the field, or anything, but the atmosphere is something crazy to talk about, something to be a part of," said Vandusen.
Wilmington College has been working the Super Bowl since 2015. They offer their students an opportunity to work at the Super Bowl. Some of the events include the NFL Fan Experience, setting up the Super Bowl breakfast, setting up tailgating events and checking in thousands of volunteers.
"What goes on in the background of these big events, just how they're ran," said Tyler Tomera-Hillier, a sophomore at Wilmington College, who explained the intrigue behind it. "It's not always the fun you see on TV, there's a lot of stress going on in the background and people are always working hard at these events."
These students know the hours are long, and they aren't making much money at these events, but it's about the exposure, and a way to get their foot in the business.
"There's 2,000 applicants for one sports management job, but they're going to get to go out and see 300 different practitioners in their field," said Ledford.
Andie Dolven, a junior at Wilmington College, talked about her first Super Bowl working experience. That was Super Bowl 56, between the Cincinnati Bengals and the Los Angeles Rams at SoFi Stadium in Inglewood, California.
"We were actually on the tram with the Cincinnati Bengals social media person and I saw it and I was too scared to say anything to him so maybe I'll regret that later," said Dolven.
