For many Penn State student-athletes, a long day of classes is surrounded by hours of intense practice.

Add games, matches, or meets to the mix and it becomes clear that free time is few and far between. However, not all student-athletes’ schedules are created equal. For some, limits are pushed as they trek through earning their infamously difficult engineering degrees.

“From the beginning, I knew my strong suits were more towards math and physics, and so engineering was always in the back of my head,” Adam Pilewicz, a men’s hockey defenseman, said. “I wasn’t sure the route I wanted to take, but after doing a little research, I chose industrial engineering.”

Diver Kamryn Umbel, a mechanical engineering major, and swimmer Will Roberson, a material science and engineering major, opted to go the engineering route after family members had already had a career in the field. For Roberson, the opportunity to get a well-paying job post-graduation without needing to attend grad school was attractive.

Fencer Sofia McGoff-Medero, meanwhile, decided to go into architectural engineering to find a job that would allow her to help people.

Each of the student-athletes agreed that any time outside of practice or athletic-related obligations is usually spent studying or doing homework assignments. McGoff-Medero said that she usually spends four to six hours a day doing assignments and studying, including weekends. 

Roberson echoed some of what McGoff-Medero said while explaining the challenges of balancing his time.

“When I’m not swimming, I’m either in class or doing work because I have to budget my time very carefully,” Roberson said. “It’s a balance…one day I’ll be like, ‘OK, I need to focus on school a little more than I might on swimming today.’”

While Umbel realized that choosing engineering as her major would be time-consuming and difficult, she said she wasn’t exactly prepared coming out of high school to tackle the work the major requires.

“I would like to say I was prepared for it but not really, because you come from high school and you think certain things are difficult and then you come to college and realize what actual difficulty is,” Umbel said. “For me, I’m a pretty organized person, so having everything written down, exactly what I am going to do that week…I get it done and that’s the only way I can do it.”

Staying organized and making sacrifices is something that McGoff-Medero, Pilewicz, Roberson, and Umbel all agree is of utmost importance for staying prepared in the classroom and in the rink, pool, or gym. 

“I definitely do have a balance because I am a very organized person,” McGoff-Medero said. “I usually schedule my study time and in a way, I do plan it around my social life, so that way I don’t miss out on so many things. For example, Friday nights, I would take them off. That would be my day off, but then throughout the week I would study really hard and not socialize as much as during the week.”

Roberson said that he is almost always doing work or studying when not in the pool. Keeping a strict schedule is something he attributes to his success in the classroom.

If a homework assignment takes longer than he thought, his schedule is thrown off, as the time that was supposed to be spent on another assignment is cut short. Making a choice between classwork and training is something that is the hardest part of balancing being an engineering major and a student-athlete, he said. 

“Some of my teammates, they’re able to spend more time doing things for swimming or working on ambitions outside of the pool,” Roberson added.

While sacrificing time is something each of the student-athletes expected when going into engineering, what they choose to sacrifice looks different depending on the individual. 

“A big part of our program is being there,” Pilewicz said. “If the guys are hanging out it’s important for you to be there, so I still try and be there as often as I can. But, there are definitely times when I’ve had to prioritize school work over having a larger social life.”

Pilewicz and Umbel agreed that having significantly more work than teammates is something that they’ve had difficulties dealing with. 

“I think that’s the hardest part — just knowing that other people are doing less than you and not doing the same assignments and work you’re doing… then you question yourself almost,” Umbel said. “Like, ‘Why am I putting myself through this because it is so difficult?'”

For McGoff-Medero, not being able to attend parties or socialize as most college students do has been a challenge.

One challenge of taking on such an intense major can be the inability to separate athletic commitments from the classroom.

“You’ll have days where you’re going to the rink and you got your mindset on this test you have tonight or an assignment that’s going to keep you up all night,” Pilewicz said. “And trying to separate, keep yourself in the moment when you’re at the rink or when you’re doing school work – not thinking about the other thing, can be really difficult at times. Especially if one of them isn’t going well.”

In order to focus on her major, McGoff-Medero ended up taking an entire academic year off from fencing her sophomore year. While she ended up not participating in any events for the Nittany Lions, she still found herself shuffling from the classroom, study and work sessions, and all-nighters to practice whenever she was able to. 

While balancing being a student-athlete and engineering major is time-consuming, taking breaks to decompress is something that can help manage the stress.

Although he doesn’t get the chance to do so as much anymore, Roberson enjoys reading, writing, and playing video games when he has downtime. Pilewicz found that taking walks and calling men’s hockey alumni is a good way to take a break from his commitments. 

At the end of the day, the unrelenting combination of classes, studying, assignments, exams, practice, games, matches, and meets is worth it.

“I just think it opens a lot of doors for me,” Pilewicz said. “There’s a lot of stuff you can do with an industrial engineering major, from engineering to business and a lot of other things – because a big thing for me is to get a good job out of college. That’s what I was always looking to do.”