BOSTON - The 2020 fall semester has undoubtedly presented challenges to student-athletes as the COVID-19 pandemic has disrupted daily life as well as the traditional college experience. Through this unprecedented time, the Bloom Family Leadership Initiative provided crucial programming and opportunities for student-athletes while supporting student-athletes in navigating this semester. 
 
The programming advanced student-athletes in three key areas; the person, performer and professional.
 
PERSON

• Looking to spearhead an effort to highlight the importance of self-care, women's hockey senior Kristina Schuler worked with the Student-Athlete Advisory Committee to start a social media campaign, where teams participated in a month-long mental health campaign by sharing and promoting self-care practices and discussed the importance of mental health. Inspired by the student-athletes, the Sports Performance team (Terrier Fuel, Terrier S&C, and BU Sport Psych) also took to social media to further share their self-care tips and practices. Mental health is one of the main pillars of SAAC for the 2020-21 school year. 
• This fall also saw the implementation of a new program for first-year student-athletes, led by women's track and field seniors, Bridget Bishop and Stephanie Forbes, women's field hockey senior Shannon Ma, and women's rowing junior Megan Mastrorilli, called the Terriers Together Mentoring Program. This program aims to help first-years adjust to being a student-athlete at BU and feel a stronger sense of community through the help of mentors from various sports. This program matched trained, student-athlete mentors with incoming students to provide them with resources and access to BFLI programming. The program will meet twice this fall and will meet two more times in the spring to provide additional development for first-year student-athletes. 

PERFORMER

• The fall semester saw the launch of captains programming. The first session was held over Zoom for all student-athlete leaders (captains, executive boards of SAAC, Athlete Ally, and Student-Athletes of Color).
• For the first session, Mark Trumbo, assistant athletics director for student-athlete engagement at Syracuse University and a leader in student-athlete development, met with BFLI student-athletes over Zoom. The first session, called Purpose Design, aided student-athletes with identity development.
• The second session was exclusive to captains. In this session, student-athletes discussed the Five Exemplary Practices of Leadership and the Student Leadership Practices Inventory. An additional development opportunity for captains will be held in the spring. 

PROFESSIONAL

• Now in its third year, the Terrier Network Mentor Program is restarting for the 2020-2021 academic year. Over 50 student-athletes signed up for the program and were matched with Terrier alumni spanning 40 industries. There will be an introductory mentor-mentee call to outline the mentor program and make the initial connection, while prompts and resources will continually be provided through the year. There will be an inclusive Terrier Network session over Zoom in the spring.
• In partnership with the Center for Career Development, the Bloom Family Leadership Initiative also offered opportunities for student-athletes to receive individualized career consultations. These sessions were offered throughout the fall semester to discuss resume and cover letter writing, interviewing, and internship and job searching. The BFLI's partnership with the Center for Career Development will continue in the spring.