BHS upgrades in athletic training lead to Safe School designation

Published 8:00 am Sunday, July 20, 2025

The night and day comparisons are not an exaggeration. Rooms that not too long ago were nothing more than bland storage areas in the Baldwin High Braves Stadium field house — and even the high school gymnasium — now hold state-of-the-art facilities to tend to all of the Brave student-athletes’ aches and pains.

It has all led to a rare Safe Sports School designation for the state of Georgia.

One person in particular will not take full credit for the Baldwin athletic department upgrades, but it helps to have someone on staff in charge of seeing what the needs are. For the 2024-25 school year, Drew Shivers, formerly of Spalding High School in Griffin, began serving that role as head athletic trainer and took the necessary actions that led to some impressive ‘before and after’ photos.

“When I first got to Baldwin, there wasn’t much of anything with athletic training,” said Shivers. “We had the room available, but no treatment spaces available. We just had cabinets. So I had to evaluate, treat and rehabilitate injured athletes on counter spaces.”

And treatment supplies? Without an athletic trainer, Shivers said nobody before him knew what was needed.

“We didn’t have much of anything when I first started,” he said.

But start he did, not discouraged at all. Rebuilding jobs can be seen as a challenge, and not just with the sports teams themselves. So much of the upgrades got done in a short period.

“We started looking at getting some of (the therapeutic equipment) starting in September, October (2024), and it was installed in November during our football playoff run,” said Shivers. “I started in July last year.

“I came to Baldwin for several reasons. One, I had worked with (athletic director Dexter) Ricks and Baldwin High School previously in 2017-18. I would cover football, basketball and wrestling at Baldwin, so I had a previous relationship.”

Coming from his hometown of Griffin in 2024 represented a “professional challenge,” something he’s come to enjoy.

“I knew this place didn’t have anything, but I could see the potential that it does have,” said Shivers.

At the high school’s basketball gym, what was once a storage closet had two tables plus equipment for physical education classes. Shivers and company began cleaning out the clutter, and they brought over some extra flooring from the field house weight room. At the field house and the gym, there are new tables. The field house now has cabinets moved over from the board of education district building when that building was undergoing renovations.

“With (former school superintendent Dr. Noris Price) and her leadership and guidance, (former) deputy superintendent Matt Adams, and (school safety and security director Corey) Goble, they have been vital parts in getting the program up and going, along with (principal Markeeta) Clayton and coach Ricks,” said Shivers.

And it’s not just about treatment of an injury. The athletic trainer is responsible for making sure the student-athletes are prepared well for games and practice, hurt or not. So much attention is placed on the summer months — and even September and October — in central Georgia due to heat-related issues. Baldwin High last school year had the use of two new hydration stations, four cold immersion tubs and a cooling zone.

“I realized one of the practice fields we use for football, it’s just a giant field with no area to have shading for athletes who get too hot,” said Shivers. “One of the rules and regulations for Georgia High School Association is to have a cooling zone. I mentioned that to Dr. Price and Mr. Goble, and they purchased the cooling zone, had that installed at that field.

“The No. 1 life-saving item you could have when it comes to heat issues is a cold immersion tub. The rule is always cool first, transport second. We were able to purchase some tubs for the football stadium, the practice field and at (the athletic complex across from Baldwin High).

“In addition to that, the water cows. We only had one operational one, and I mentioned to Mr. Goble that if we could, purchase more water cows to have not only at football practices but also track meets and practices to allow more people to hydrate at the same time.”

So what about the immediate impact of all of these upgrades, the tables and chairs? Anything happen that would have been catastrophic under the old set-up?

Shivers recalled where one football player at a morning practice had a collapsed lung. It came from catching the football and then falling directly onto the ball.

“At the time, we didn’t have all of these items, but the school system did purchase a really good stethoscope,” said Shivers, “which allowed me to listen to the internal system. I was able to recognize that it was a collapsed lung and call EMS. That was probably the worst (incident) this year.”

The student-athlete recovered well enough to be a state qualifier for Baldwin High in track and field.

One more upgrade for Baldwin High athletic training is a CTAE Sports Medicine Lab at the high school. CTAE stands for Career Technical Agricultural Education and has a Career Pathways program in sports medicine. There are three classes: Introduction to Health Care, Essentials to Health Care and Sports Medicine. Shivers said the lab provides hands-on experiences (feeling what an injury feels like), provides for a thermo-therapy lab, or a heat therapy lab and teaches the benefits of using ultra-sound for the treatment of injuries.

“There are several different types of stimulations you can use,” said Shivers. “Russian Stim is used post-surgical. There’s also IFC, Interferential Current, which is more of a pain modulation type stimulation.

“We also have dumbbells in there, because as part of that pathway you have to learn different types of muscle contractions, isokinetic, isometric, concentric. Using the weights, you can better teach hands on.”

Baldwin High’s athletic training for the past school year also involved students from Georgia College & State University. Shivers himself is a 2017 GCSU graduate with a bachelor of science degree in athletic training. He said, since then, the career for a trainer has taken a different pathway in now it requires a mandated master’s degree.

“I host Georgia College master’s athletic training students,” said Shivers. “As a part of their program, they have to go to various clinical sites. They will get different experiences. I was able to give back to the program that gave so much to me. Those students have been vital to the athletic training of Baldwin High School.”

As far as the GHSA regulations go, Shivers said Baldwin High is in full compliance. It’s now a matter of keeping up with new legislation.

“Some of the things I’ve helped improve is the concussion protocol,” said Shivers. “We’ll do Sway baseline testing (balance and cognitive tests) on all of our athletes. We will do a gradual return-to-play protocol for all athletes who do have a concussion. That’s following the newest research based on the 2024 physician’s statement released by the National Athletic Trainers’ Association.

“With these cold immersion tubs and cooling zones, we were able to implement the best practices for heat illnesses.”

As for the upcoming year, Shivers said there’s House Bill 874, which calls for a specific emergency action plan for sports.

For now, all the work at Baldwin High has led to a Safe Sports School designation. Before, only 20 schools in Georgia had this national recognition.

“(Mr. Goble and I) worked hand-in-hand to do step-by-step checkoffs to make sure our school system fell in line,” said Shivers.

One of Shivers’ former students, Kaitlin Hailey, took over Shivers’ former position at Spalding High.

“It’s a large profession, but also kind of small,” he said. “To help Baldwin keep up with schools that have had ATs for a long time, I have been in coordination with the athletic trainer in Crisp County, and I’ve also been in contact with Tripp Youngblood at Peach County. Those are two Safe Sports Schools. I have been in contact with them bouncing ideas off to help build Baldwin to where it should be.”

The Baldwin team orthopedic surgeon is Dr. Matthew Toth of Ortho Georgia, and Shivers said there is coordination between the two of them whenever an athlete is involved. Shivers said Toth works with all other schools in the county high school and college. He said there’s an additional resource through OrthoAtlanta in Macon.

“I love being in athletic training because of the relationships you build with the kids,” said Shivers. “The kids make the job fun because of their joking demeanor. I have a different relationship with the student-athletes than the coaches do. Coaches have to be hard on them. I have to build a relationship where they feel comfortable enough to tell me things they won’t tell their coach. I haven’t had a negative experience.”

Some statistics Shivers provided to the Baldwin County Board of Education earlier this year are that 62% of sports-related injuries occur during practice and that 2.6 million children are treated in emergency facilities each year for sports-related injuries.

“Practices are where most injuries occur because of the amount of time and reps the athletes are participating,” he said. “In games, it’s more of a short burst. (In football) you have offense and defense, and they don’t go on the field at the same time.”