Tarleton State University’s Kinesiology Department is making big changes to their podcast. After almost two years of production a group of four Kinesiology Department Graduate Assistants are restructuring and setting new goals in the hopes of increasing their audience.

In 2018, Dr. Kayla Peak and her three Graduate Assistants, Elianne Douglass-Miron, Patrick Freehill and Zane Guadagnolo created Frontrunners Podcast with a vision in mind. That vision was to create an educational podcast to help kinesiology students, staff and alumni learn more about their career path outside of the classroom.

Now, with a fresh set of eyes, the podcast is taking on a new goal; to educate students of all career goals about how kinesiology interacts with their future career. This semester, the four kinesiology graduate assistants decided to give Frontrunners Podcast a bit of a makeover. These students are Frontrunners Podcast’s Director and Producer Lane Senn, and the podcast’s Social Media Coordinators Kaity Burris, Sydney Shippey and Josh Willis.

Senn spoke about what to expect with this big change and how it altered the original goal of the podcast. Senn explained that they no longer want the podcast to be exclusive to kinesiology students, staff and alumni.

“Originally the purpose of the podcast was to expand our social media presence for students, faculty and alumni to get more information about kinesiology, but now we’re at the point where we want to involve students from every department,” Senn said.

This new goal is not the only change, the podcast will also have a new structure. There will be four segments, all of which showcase different experiences of college life.

The first segment mentioned is “Education Station,” where they’ll stick to the educational style as before and they’ll continue to have informative conversations with professionals in the appropriate field of study. Senn also stressed that this segment will not be exclusive to kinesiology.

“This segment can include any major. Professors always have topics they want to talk about, so this segment is where they can do that,” Senn said.

The next segment is called “What Would John Tarleton Do?” or WWJTD. In this segment they will highlight departments, other organizations on campus and the activities they’re hosting. Lane expressed that these are the things on campus that will likely be a topic of conversation for a long time.

“These are your things like housing, financial aid, on campus dining or the Tarleton Activities Board. They’re always going to be here, so we’ll highlight the things that students need and want to learn about,” Senn said.

Another segment they’re offering is “Finish Line.” During this segment the Graduate Assistants will discuss topics together that they find interesting. This is not exclusive to kinesiology. They will also conduct a Q&A section answering the questions from the previous podcast session.

The last segment is called “For Texans by Texans,” or 4TXT. This segment is a big change for the Frontrunners Podcast. The goal of this section is to make the podcast more student-centered.

“We wanted to make the podcast centered more towards students instead of educational for the faculty and staff. So that means working on highlighting student achievements, discussing classes and their difficulty and how students are surviving college,” Senn said. “This way, when someone goes to listen to the podcast they can learn something but also know that they aren’t alone going through the struggle of college.”

Burris explained how you can find kinesiology in the strangest places, even in large corporations. Burris’s sister works at Google Headquarters in Austin, TX and has access to some very cool breaktime activities.

“At the Austin location they provide fitness activities, so during their breaks they can go get a massage, join a fitness class or take a quick nap. There’s opportunity anywhere,” Burris said.

The Frontrunners Podcast will be airing twice a week on Monday and Thursday. The publication time may vary. The podcasts are expected to be between 10 to 15 minutes long to maintain the audience’s attention. A perfect amount of time for a quick break from your schoolwork.

Senn and Burris also mentioned that some of the longer podcasts may be released in two parts.

While the podcast is still growing and changing, it’s important that students don’t miss this opportunity to see its progression. The Frontrunners Podcast offers a variety of different view points from influential Tarleton faculty and staff. This serves as a place where your voice, as a student, can be heard.

If you’d like to listen to the podcast you can find it on Apple Music or Spotify if you search “Frontrunners Podcast”.

More information about Frontrunners, or how you can be a part of the podcast, can be found by following the Kinesiology Department’s Instagram, Twitter and Facebook @Tarleton_Kine, or you can send an email to [email protected].