April 25, 2025
Shaw Local
NewsSportsBearseNewspaperObituariesNewsletterWeekend PlansEvent Calendar

Yorkville School District 115 to hire two athletic trainers

By Mark Foster
Yorkville High School Associate Principal Luke Engelhardt is seen here in the school's sports training room on May 22, 2023.

Yorkville High School Associate Principal Luke Engelhardt is seen here in the school's sports training room on May 22, 2023. (Mark Foster)

YORKVILLE – School District 115 is moving ahead with plans to hire two professional athletic trainers.

The Yorkville school board approved the proposal at a committee meeting June 12.

The trainers will provide strength and conditioning programing, conduct physical testing and perform injury prevention and care services for student athletes at Yorkville High School and Yorkville Academy.

Currently, the school district contracts with a private firm to provide the training services.

However, at a school board meeting on May 22, YHS Principal David Travis and Associate Principal for Athletics, Activities and Facilities Luke Engelhardt recommended the change.

While the contract calls for two trainers, market pressures have meant that only one trainer is being provided by the contractor.

Travis and Engelhardt told the board they are concerned that the district could lose the other trainer at any time because of a provision in the contract to end the arrangement with only 30 days notice.

Engelhardt explained that the contract firm is planning to increase the cost it charges the district for each trainer from the current $35,000 to $60,000.

Travis and Engelhardt said the district could hire two trainers for about the same amount of money it would have to pay the private contractor under the planned increase.

School board members are expected to give final approval for the proposal at their June 26 meeting.

There are about 850 student-athletes at the main high school and the freshman academy, many of them playing on more than one of 24 sports teams.

The high school maintains a well-equipped sports medicine and training room, where the trainers can perform procedures from measuring a wrestler’s body fat to testing a football player for a concussion.