Taylor Vaske.

My name is Taylor Vaske and I work for Athletico Physical Therapy in Waterloo as a contracted employee in the Union Community School District. I am currently in my 10th year serving as the head athletic trainer at Union High School where I oversee the health and well-being of our student-athletes and staff through preventative measures, injury assessment, acute care, rehabilitation, referral, and emergency preparedness. I also serve as a preceptor for the University of Northern Iowa’s Master of Athletic Training program in which I mentor and provide clinical experience opportunities for both graduate and undergraduate students.

On average, I see approximately 20-30 student-athletes each day and am required to quickly and efficiently prepare those athletes for practices and competitions, make decisions regarding their participation status, and provide follow-up treatments and rehabilitation. During the 2024-2025 school year, I had nearly 2,600 student-athlete sign-ins to my athletic training room and oversaw the clinical education experience for 10 graduate and undergraduate students from UNI.

At its current state, the athletic training room at UHS is approximately 120 square feet and houses one treatment table, one taping table, one whirlpool, one small storage cabinet, and an ice machine. This leaves a very limited amount of space to be able to move within the room. Such a small, cluttered area makes it incredibly difficult to be efficient in getting our student-athletes assessed and treated in a timely manner. I am unable to fit more than 1-2 student-athletes in the room at a time and am frequently required to utilize the hallways to conduct my work, impeding the flow of traffic between the equipment room, gym, and locker room. The lack of space available in the athletic training room means that I am also required to store any extra supplies in the media center, which takes away needed space from the rest of our staff.

The proposed UCSD facilities improvement bond referendum would more than triple the size of our athletic training room and provide us with updated equipment, additional tables, and much needed storage space for supplies. Not only would this bond provide our student-athletes and staff at Union a better experience and quality of care, it would allow me to perform my job more efficiently and offer improved clinical experience opportunities for future athletic trainers to get quality, hands-on education at a time when there is such a dire need for this service across the country.

Taylor Vaske, LAT, ATC is the head athletic trainer at Union High School and a resident of Waterloo.