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Passion Teacher training for wheelchair basketball in Sydney
Posted: Monday September 20, 1999 04:29 PM
LOUISVILLE, Ky. (AP) -- On the first day of class, Amy Verst tells her nursing students to expect two things from her: to occasionally cancel their class and to talk a lot about basketball. For the pediatric nursing professor at Bellarmine College in Louisville, the basketball is wheelchair hoops and the occasional canceled class the result of her passion for the sport. Verst is a member of the U.S. Women's Wheelchair Basketball team and will compete in the Pan Am Games in Mexico City next month. Next fall, the team will compete in Sydney, Australia, in the 2000 Olympic Games. "I think about what I do, and I am amazed -- I've got both a great academic career and a great athletic career," Verst said. Balancing both, however, is tough, Verst says. She juggles her time between teaching three classes at Bellarmine [one senior-level nursing course and two freshmen seminar courses], daily workouts and practices with a Lexington team, the Wheelcats, that she coaches. "It means some long days," she said, "but it is worth it." Verst, 33, began playing wheelchair basketball in 1995 after being diagnosed with a degenerative neuromuscular disease, which slowly diminishes basic bodily functions. Verst wears a pacemaker to regulate her heartbeat and breathes through a hole in her trachea. At first, Verst said she didn't think it was appropriate for her to play wheelchair sports -- Verst can still stand and maneuver. To be eligible to play wheelchair sports nationally, one must have an illness that causes at least a minimal disability. But a friend persuaded her to play and she joined the Los Angeles Sparks Women's wheelchair team, which won the national championship in 1998 and earned a spot on a Team Cheerios cereal box. Verst also wins praise as a faculty member in Bellarmine's School of Nursing, where she has taught since 1993. "She is a breath of fresh air," said Susan Davis, dean of the nursing school. "Amy relates to the students very well, but she also holds them to the highest standards." Students agree that she adds a new element to the lecture hall. Students take field trips to play basketball with area children who use wheelchairs. "She was a lot of fun in the classroom," said Suzanne Pike, a nurse at the Norton HealthCare Center in Louisville, who took Verst's class this spring. "She was one of those professors who you could be a friend with outside the classroom," she said.
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