Eric Tweedie

M.S., Athletic Training, 2019

Striving for Excellence

Eric Tweedie is driven by one goal: to become the very best clinician he can. As Medical Assistant at Excel Orthopedic Specialists, he’s gaining the skills and experience he needs to do just that. Eric assists clinic providers daily in everything from cast removal and ordering tests such as MRIs to billing and patient processing.

After completing his bachelor’s in exercise physiology, Eric took a year off to shadow physical therapists and athletic trainers and to narrow his focus and choose the best career fit for him. He selected athletic training as his first option because of his interest in the more specific injuries and problems of athletes.

“Learning new skills and knowledge in the classroom and then using them at my clinical sites was very beneficial. I was able to see what being an ATC would be like before graduating and to get a good feel for how everything works.”

Exploring his passion for helping athletes and patients

During the MSAT program, Eric gained nine months of experience at various practicum sites to learn firsthand what was expected of athletic trainers at the professional level. At Haverhill High School, UMASS Lowell, and Tufts University, he conducted all tasks that a certified AT would conduct when helping patients.

This field work was a crucial part of Eric’s learning and graduate work, enabling him to further explore his real passion: working with athletes one-on-one and identifying different techniques and tools to treat and rehabilitate injuries more effectively.

“I got a lot of experience in being able to figure out what I was good at and what I needed to work on in order to become a better clinician,” he says. “I feel very fortunate to have been able to try a test run of my career path before getting out in the real world.”

“Utilize every aspect of your clinical sites and try to do as much as you can while there, since that is your opportunity to see and do everything an athletic trainer does before becoming one yourself.”