Jun 23, 2026Q&A: UConn athletic trainer shares lessons from facility upgrade
In April 2025, the University of Connecticut broke ground on a multimillion-dollar renovation of its Bailey Student-Athlete Success Center, which includes athletic training and sports medicine facilities. The project is expected to be completed in January 2027 and will serve as the home of UConn’s field hockey, tennis, rowing and men’s and women’s track and field teams.
Patti Kula is senior associate athletic trainer for cross country and track and field at UConn and has worked at the university for nearly 24 years, winning 26 championships with several athletic programs. In the following interview, Kula details her experience working alongside university officials, architects, vendors and other stakeholders as part of the renovation and shares what other college athletic trainers should consider for their own upgrades.
Q: What are the training room essentials that should be considered for facilities at all levels?
A: Space is the No. 1 thing, and how much space you can actually get. That’s going to dictate a lot of what you’re actually able to do. Look at your proximity to the fields and other areas you need to provide coverage for. Is there a shared facility? If you’ve got a weight room that you can share equipment with or other areas that you can share space and equipment with, [you can] prioritize your necessary functions off that. If you don’t have room for everything, you’ve got to prioritize what is necessary to you, and that’s going to be a little bit different based on what other facilities are around there, what level you’re at, what teams you’re working with, all that kind of stuff.
Q: What were some of your most important priorities for the upgraded athletic training facilities?
A: The athletic training [department] was really involved from the beginning. We did get to dictate a lot of the priorities that we’re going to utilize the space for, and we were even able to lobby for how much space we needed relative to the number of athletes we serve.
The priorities that we looked at were really rehab space and to include weight equipment at a much higher level than we had before. So, actual hamstring curls and knee extensions and all the cable columns, more resistance [equipment] than we could have before. My background is in Pilates, so we had to have a reformer. [We had to have] cardiac equipment, which we use not only for rehab but also cross training, which is part of the preventative maintenance.
Hydrotherapy is huge. In our original space before the renovation, we had a regular-sized pool right next to us and we utilized that all the time. So, to work with SwimEx and get a pool and cold and warm tubs, that was something we were not willing to compromise on. Now our athletes don’t have to run to other facilities to utilize this. Then we prioritized a lot of software and recovery and those kinds of things. We have a full recovery room and massage room going in. That will service beyond just the athletes or the teams that are housed in the facility. It might even sound silly, but having more high-low treatment tables and more is huge, too.
We’ll have a procedure room with musculoskeletal ultrasound and C-Arm X-rays … and our physicians can function over there as well.
The TV screens that are ubiquitous will have mobility programs posted on them because we spend so much time educating. Now we can give athletes a reference and we can individualize what’s on each screen.
Q: How much did functionality and storage factor into the upgrade?
We definitely did our best to make it flow well and make it friendly for all the different tasks we have because it’s such a multifaceted profession.
A: Our biggest hurdle for probably decades was the lack of space in the athletic training room that was in [the Bailey Student-Athlete Success Center]. It was just way too small.
We tried to keep an eye on the future of what we don’t know, and then more [equipment] could be added, personnel could be added [in the future]. Different pieces of modality and equipment are certainly always coming out new, so we wanted to make it versatile and have the ability where we weren’t stuck too much to a floor plan. … We’re not going to be able to just up and move some of those big pieces of equipment, but where we could, we tried to allow for the idea the way we have it set up and the equipment we have may not always serve as the optimal service. So, we’ve got to have the ability to change that.
Storage was key because we have a distinct lack of storage, so now, we’ve got a high density storage area and then we’ve got a separate area where we can do all of our water props — coolers and ice machines are right there. We definitely did our best to make it flow well and make it friendly for all the different tasks we have because it’s such a multifaceted profession.
Q: How much did you and other athletic trainers collaborate with others working on the project?
A: They really involved us from the very beginning with our list of needs and wants all the way through. It was our athletic administration, it was the university planning officials, architects, facilities staff [and] equipment vendors.
Being involved early was paramount because what we do is a unique mix, at least at this level of medicine and athletics.
Being involved early was paramount because what we do is a unique mix, at least at this level of medicine and athletics. So, if you try to go in and just build a medical facility, it doesn’t really work, and if you just think about it from an athletics perspective, I don’t think that’s going to work either. We talked to the architects … and they seemed very willing to try and understand what we needed. When we would look at something and say, “That’s not going to work and this is why,” then they were interested in the why as well. I think that was key because it moved us forward.
It’s little things, too. The facility itself has rowing tanks going in and … there was a pool that was right next to us. I think a lot of people assumed it would make sense to put the rowing tanks where the pool was. At one point they had us in various sections and then we just had to explain that our workday isn’t two hours in an office and two hours in a training room; it’s all intertwined throughout the day. We needed to be in one space and we couldn’t have [certain] therapy spaces separate because it’s got to be supervised. … That one meeting was pivotal to get us what we needed in a way that worked within the planning and the budget.
At one point, the architects walked through our football facility and through their athletic training room because it’s about the same size space. … It was just easy to point out where we would be different, this is what we really like, those kinds of things.
Q: What advice would you give other athletic trainers who are facing their own renovations and how they should approach the project?
A: Do your research, whether it’s checking out other facilities for things you like and don’t like and talk to other people — not just athletic trainers. One of our strength coaches had a piece of advice for me on software. Talk to facilities staff. One of our facilities workers who works with the pool was really helpful. Be open to all the different facets and start to look around and be a little prepared before you have to sit down and start doing that.
Find people who are willing to work with you. [SwimEx] was able to tweak a couple things to our space. There’s some things you can’t change, especially with the footprint of a pool already there … but they were able to fit in and still give us what we use. Find people who can straddle across the different entities you have to work with.
The other thing is stay organized and have any information ready to go because it’s not just a month-long planning project. I’ve got a big team that’s in season from August to June. Those things don’t go away, but now you’ve also got to get these meetings in. Staying organized and having the information ready to go that you know is going to be needed is huge. You can’t be afraid to ask questions.
