On June 5, 2019, Northern Illinois University Athletics officially dedicated the Northwestern Medicine Performance Center and Phi Sigma Kappa Alumni Association of NIU Nutrition Center Wednesday morning in front of a gathering of university and community dignitaries, NIU coaches and Huskie student-athletes.
The creation of the Nutrition Center will positively impact every NIU student-athlete as well, providing healthy nutrition options throughout the day as student-athletes go from workouts to class, from study tables to practice. The involvement of campus partners, like Campus Dining Services and the College of Health and Human Sciences, will add staffing who will educate student-athletes on nutrition and dietary information, meal planning and more.
Kent Ebersold, President of the Phi Sigma Kappa Alumni Association of NIU, believes the partnership between the Greek alumni organization and NIU Athletics may be the first of its kind nationally.
"It is unheard of for a fraternity alumni association, I believe, to do something like this," Ebersold said. "To have the wherewithal, the leadership that we have had over our 50 years here [at NIU] for a fraternity alumni association to do what we have just done, and partnering with Northwestern Medicine, in my mind is unprecedented. Phi Sigma Kappa Alumni Association takes great pride that for over 10 years, we, as a Greek organization, have been a supporter of the NIU foundation and athletics. With this additional level of support, we will continue to demonstrate our unwavering commitment to NIU students."
The College of Health and Human Sciences, under the direction of Dean Derryl Block, will play a role in the nutrition education and dietetics area. Frazier was thankful for that partnership which illustrates the symbiosis between athletics and academics at NIU.
"Through the campus partnership with Dean Block and Josephine Umoren in Health and Human Sciences, we will be able to provide students in the areas of nutrition and dietetics with significant experience, using athletics as a tool of education," Frazier said. "This component and these partnerships put a stamp on the fact that we are a part of the mission and more importantly we're providing services for our students for the future."
Addressing the mental health component will be a joint project of NIU Athletics staff in collaboration with Northwestern Medicine, as they will work together to provide mental health services and support.
"We all know that we're dealing with a real epidemic on mental health and the crisis around mental health issues and support for our students," Frazier said. "What we're doing with this performance center specifically is having education, and, more importantly, joint programming both with Phi Sig and Northwestern Medicine. We're going to drill down on what those issues are and provide those level of services. We need them in DeKalb, we need them at NIU, and most importantly, we need to be able to help our young people through these tough times."
