This feature originally appeared in the Spring edition of the Cal Sports Quarterly. The Cal Athletics flagship magazine features long-form sports journalism at its finest and provides in-depth coverage of the scholar-athlete experience in Berkeley. Printed copies are mailed four times a year to Bear Backers who give annually at the Bear Club level (currently $600 or more). For more information on how you can receive a printed version of the Cal Sports Quarterly at home, send an email to CalAthleticsFund@berkeley.edu or call (510) 642-2427.



Greg Aponte is a professor of Nutritional Sciences and Toxicology at Cal, specializing in communication between the gut and brain.
 
If he ever gets bored with that subject matter, he could always play defensive line for the Golden Bears football team.
 
Aponte is a thriving member of Cal's Faculty Fellows program, which pairs a volunteer faculty member with a sports team on campus. The mission of the program is to enhance the link between athletics and academics through mentorship and partnership.
 
While most teams at Cal have one faculty member serving as its fellow, the football program has one for each position group because of its sheer size. Aponte has worked with multiple positions on the Bears' defense.
 
"Greg was like another defensive lineman with us," said former Cal defensive end Rusty Becker, who exhausted his eligibility last fall. "He would come to our meetings and he definitely seemed to grow with his football knowledge. I really feel like he could have played on the D-line with us with how much he learned."
 
Turns out the student-athletes across Cal's athletic department are learning and benefitting a lot from the Faculty Fellows program. Faculty members are there to provide knowledge of the campus, its programs and courses while understanding the time demands of a Division I student-athlete. They attend games, practices, team meetings and other functions while serving as a resource to assist student-athletes with their academic needs and concerns.
 
"One of the challenges with Athletics is there is kind of a silo, as if Intercollegiate Athletics is a completely different entity," said Meg Conkey, a Professor Emerita of Anthropology at Cal and the Faculty Fellow for the Golden Bears lacrosse team. "Many of our student-athletes are incredibly bright. There are a lot of faculty that understand the value of organized sports. These are young, bright kids who have taken on an enormous amount of time, commitment and energy to represent Cal the best that they can."
 
The Faculty Fellows program was started by Cal's Athletic Study Center in 2004. After the release of the 2014 Task Force on Academics & Athletics, Conkey and Classics Professor Kim Shelton helped update the program by working to review the engagement of the various Fellows. Not only is there turnover in coaches, but faculty also may adjust their priorities or retire or go on leave.
 
Most teams on campus now have a Faculty Fellow, and the benefits appear to travel in both directions.
 
"I don't look at this as mentorship. It's a partnership," Aponte said. "The faculty can learn something from these students. For most of these students in team sports, it's not about themselves as individuals, but as a part of a collective unit. Faculty might have a team in their lab, or a team supporting their work. As a Faculty Fellow they can learn new ways to coach their team, and appreciate what it take to make productive unit."
 
Aponte forged a tight relationship with defensive line coach Tony Tuioti, who left Cal in February to join the staff at Nebraska. Tuioti invited Aponte to kick off defensive meetings once a week, a segment the coach coined "Wisdom Wednesdays."
 
Aponte began each session by showing the student-athletes an image and asking for their interpretation of it. On one occasion, he showed the players a picture of bamboo plants, intending to demonstrate the idea that the taller you grow, the lower you bow – a nod to humility. But several players took a team approach, saying it showed that in order to grow, you have to grow in groups.
 
"That was not what I was planning to talk about," Aponte said. "It was amazing. They were saying you don't grow alone. I hadn't thought of that. So I learned something."
 
Aponte's revelation is one of many examples of faculty being enriched by their relationship with their teams. Conkey, who grew up in suburban Philadelphia where lacrosse has a deep history, played the sport in high school and attends every Cal home game in addition to practices, meetings, banquets and other team functions.
 
"It's another way of being involved with the lives of students," Conkey said. "It gives us a connection with another group other than our own students. One of our missions here is not to just teach the subject matter that we teach, but to be involved in the development of these young people for the future. It's really a pleasure to be involved with their development and see where young people are today."
 
Mark D'Esposito, a professor of Neuroscience and Psychology and Director of the Henry H. Wheeler Jr. Brain Imaging Center, had multiple forms of inspiration to become the Faculty Fellow for the Cal baseball team. Former Cal pitcher Chris Muse-Fisher took one of his undergraduate courses and subsequently worked in his lab for one year after graduating to prepare for medical school. He is now a student at Tufts University School of Medicine. D'Esposito also chairs the on-campus Senate Athletic Council – a committee designed to oversee the well-being of student-athletes. In addition, his son, Zac, attended Cal baseball camps and played for the California Warriors, a travel baseball program started by current assistant Golden Bear coach Noah Jackson.
 
"It was inspiring to see how much time (Muse-Fisher) was putting into sports, yet he was able to keep up with the demands of a premed major," D'Esposito said. "It was also enlightening to me to see how he handled both. Clearly, balancing sports and academics is challenging. Anytime faculty are willing to engage as advisors to student athletes to meet this challenge, it will be a positive experience for both the student and faculty."
 
Aponte sees similarities between student-athletes and many faculty members – that both are highly motivated and each group defines themselves by what they do "as opposed to who they are."
 
"These students are exceptional," Aponte said. "They define themselves by what they do and if they don't do it, they are at odds with who they are, what they are, and their perceived self-worth. However, they are more vulnerable than faculty because they haven't had the time to develop a perspective that comes with age. There should be a natural empathy that facilitates a partnership with these students to help get them through some of those dilemmas."
 
Many of the Faculty Fellows played organized sports as youth or had family members who did. A few of them are even former collegiate student-athletes themselves. Derek Van Rheenen, a Ph.D. who directs Cal's Cultural Studies of Sports in Education Master's program, played soccer for the Bears and is a member of the Cal Athletics Hall of Fame. He is the current Faculty Fellow for men's soccer. Berkeley Law Professor Amanda Tyler, the Faculty Fellow for the Bears' women's soccer program, played soccer at Stanford. And while Cal alum Maggi Kelly played water polo before Cal had a varsity women's program, she was a member of the U.S. National Team for 10 years, was inducted into the Cal Hall of Fame in 2007 and is the Faculty Fellow for the Bears' women's water polo program now.
 
"It gives our players another layer of information," lacrosse coach Brooke Eubanks said. "(Conkey) understands the hours and time that student-athletes put into their days. Just having an ambassador like her to really promote the work that our student-athletes are doing is huge. We truly feel that Meg is part of our program."
 
Aponte, who also serves on the Senate Athletic Council, believes student-athletes "are a notch up from most of us."
 
"They are a group of people that are extremely motivated and are placing an extraordinary amount of energy toward a passion," he said. "Most people don't do that. Faculty Fellows is a partnership to help develop their character, and provide academic support to give them confidence to become the leaders they are being trained to be - A leadership training that our students might not realize they are acquiring as athletes at Cal.
 
"It's really an opportunity to have a student make a difference on your life, and potentially make a difference on a student's life."