The Fitness and Wellness graduate assistant position at Southeast Missouri State University's Recreation Center-North is a two-year commitment focused toward teaching leadership skills provided through on-the-job experience.

It is an entry level based position with professional level benefits, but applicants must maintain a certain skill set to be considered according to Sara Wagganer, assistant director of Fitness and Wellness.

"This job ideally prepares them for a career in recreational services," Wagganer said. "You've got to have some specific skills. I can't just hire anyone. I'd prefer someone that has had some experience with personal training and teaching group fitness. I don't expect them to have experience with both. I would say not required, but recommendations or someone that has some sort of fitness certification, personal training, or group fitness certification. It just shows me they're passionate about this type of thing. Intramurals, club sports, facilities, aquatics, all those different areas you get some experience with working in."

Graduates obtaining a bachelor's degree who are interested in gaining managerial experience might find the graduate assistant position to be a helpful opportunity.

The position will allow the graduate assistant to have an understanding of all areas in the facility.

The current graduate assistant of Fitness and Wellness is Danny Provencio who holds a bachelor's degree in kinesiology with a concentration in exercise science.

"I didn't have a lot of hands-on experience with Fitness and Wellness until this job," Provencio said. "I would say it taught me a lot about being more interpersonal with the faculty and staff that we have and the students that are coming in. It really taught me about programming too; what programs students want to see and how to go about marketing those."

Provencio shares a large part of the responsibilities in the department with Wagganer, such as managing the staff as well as handling, organizing and updating fitness registration forms. He has occupied the position since the fall of 2013 and is pursuing a master's degree in nutrition and exercise science at Southeast.

"I assist with the operations of group fitness and personal training," Provencio said. "We shadow group instructors and give them feedback on classes. The graduate assistant teaches a professional development course every semester so you definitely want a good background on it because you're going to be teaching undergrads about it."

The graduate assistant position will not be available until May, but the interviewing and selection process is scheduled to take place near the end of March.

Wagganer said only two application submissions have been made but she expects many more due to the amount of time left to apply.

"I do have a few strong candidates already," Wagganer said. "I'd like to hire in-house honestly but if I can't find anyone then I'll go to our big national conference and look for people. I tend to form a small committee so I might have an intern or other professional staff get together and do a day where I just have interviews. I have a feeling it's going to be a difficult decision, but it will be good to have some other opinions in there."

For information about how to apply for the graduate assistant position, email Wagganer at swagganer@semo.edu.

Information is also available on portal.semo.edu in the Personal Announcements section of the Campus tab.