Head Athletic Trainer Chloe Kipnis has worked at Marlborough for eight years, assisting with sports injuries by diagnosing, treating and aiding students in recovery.
Growing up, Kipnis played basketball and softball on both club and school teams. She did not have athletic trainers employed at her high school but would see them at club tournaments, which sparked her interest in the occupation.
“At club tournaments, they hired athletic trainers and I thought it was so cool that these people were involved in sports and health care,” Kipnis said. “I was interested in sports, and I knew that I wanted to be in a health care profession entering college, so being able to combine both of these sparked my interest in the profession.”
In order to become an athletic trainer, one has to obtain a pre-athletic training degree from a bachelor’s program and an athletic training degree from a master’s program. However, California is the only state that allows for any high school to hire an athletic trainer without an official certification. Kipnis has been working towards establishing regulations for high school athletic trainers.
“Athletic training majors have to go through a lot of school because we are very qualified health care providers,” Kipnis said. “When someone gets hurt, we do a whole evaluation, we refer them to the doctor if needed, we help to get swelling down and do further rehabilitation, so a lot of stuff happens behind the scenes that people don’t see.”
Kipnis works with around three to six students every school day. When she is not meeting with students, she works on documentation such as paperwork to allow athletes to return to their teams after having COVID or a concussion. After the school day ends, she attends Marlborough sports games to provide assistance to athletes.
“I have the majority of the day to see students,” Kipnis said. “I meet with students for around 30 minutes each in order to provide them proper one-on-one attention to help with any lingering issues.”
Although she loves to see the success of Marlborough’s sports teams, her favorite part of being an athletic trainer has been seeing the growth of students.
“As this is my eighth year working at Marlborough, I have been able to see two full classes grow all the way from 7th to 12th grade,” Kipnis said. “The growth that they make in their sports and seeing them mature is the most rewarding part of my job.”
