Rinehart Returns to UNI to Pursue Master's Degree

CEDAR FALLS, Iowa - Chad Rinehart did what most football players dream of doing. He had a successful collegiate career, earning All-America and All-Conference recognition. He was drafted into the NFL and played in the league for seven years.

But Rinehart has another dream that he is pursuing this year as an unsigned free agent. A dream that stems back to when he walked the campus at UNI from 2003-07 while he completed his degree in sport psychology. And to achieve that dream, he has returned to that campus, to make that walk again.

"I am pursuing a master's in kinesiology," Rinehart said. "I always planned on going back to school after I was done with my playing career. I felt that the two year transition while working on my master's would give me an opportunity to decide what I wanted to do career wise."

When it came to going back to school, the decision as to where he would go was an easy one.

"I have trained each off-season at UNI, and my family loves calling Cedar Falls home," Rinehart said. "I have continued to have a great relationship with many of the professors on campus and was excited to continue learning from them."

The three-time, first-team All-MVFC offensive lineman has always held academics in high regard. He earned first-team MVFC Scholar-Athlete twice during his time at UNI and was named an FCS ADA Academic All-Star and to the CoSIDA Academic All-District team. Those awards and recognitions didn't come without organization and hard work.

"During my undergraduate degree, my academics began to improve to where I wanted to be when I began to set aside two nights a week to go to the library or union," Rinehart said. "Academics were and are very important to me. My parents made a lot of sacrifices while my siblings and I were growing up to ensure that we would all be able to afford our college degrees."

For someone who has been training as a collegiate and professional athlete, sports psychology and kinesiology were easy fits for the Boone, Iowa, native. Entering college undecided on a degree, it didn't take long for his passion to fall into his lap.

"I bounced around a few majors my first two years of undergraduate and decided to take a sport psychology class and immediately saw improvements in my athletic play by applying what I was learning.

"For my master's, I had stayed up-to-date on human performance during my career in the NFL and have continued to find there is a gap between the research and application in performance. So, in graduate school I will be focusing on ways to bridge that gap between the research and methods of applying to sport to improve performance," Rinehart said.

The NCAA has adopted the saying that most student-athletes will "go pro" in something other than sports. Rinehart has taken that to heart and believes that should be the mindset for current and future student-athletes.

"The statistics are clear in showing that the majority of all college athlete will not make a living playing their sport," he said. "So, the athletes must put in four or five years of academic work to stay eligible. Earning a degree represents the completion of that work and those who choose not to complete their degree show that they do not value their own time."

Rinehart put in his work. He received countless academic awards, recognition for his play on the field as a 6-5, 321-pound offensive lineman and has now played for the Washington Redskins, the New York Jets, the Buffalo Bills and most recently with the San Diego Chargers. Despite being multiple years removed from college, he still attributes a lot of his success to values he learned as a collegiate student-athlete. Values he intends to put back in place when he becomes a student once again this fall.

"Being an athlete has aided me in developing new methods to achieve success," Rinehart said. "In order to continue to improve as an athlete, I had to develop new playing techniques and training methods while maintaining my foundation. Listening and being coachable or teachable transcends the athletic and outside world."

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Rinehart Returns to UNI to Pursue Master's Degree

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Rinehart Returns to UNI to Pursue Master's Degree

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