Welcome to the Director Download, powered by Campus Rec Magazine.
It’s time to go behind the curtain of the director role and have honest discussions with leaders in the campus recreation industry.
In this episode, host Grady Sheffield, the director of campus recreation at Towson University and the senior advisor to the Campus Rec Mastermind Groups, gives you the listener real and authentic conversation between himself and special guest Jorge Juarez, the executive director of Sun Devil Fitness at Arizona State University.
Juarez shares about his humble beginnings and the road he took to finally leave Texas, finding himself at Arizona State.
He and Sheffield also talk about the role of family and work-life balance. It started early in his career but has continued to be an important aspect of his role as a director, especially when it comes to overseeing four separate facilities on four distinct campuses.
So whether it’s moderating the 2023 Campus Rec Leadership Summit, diving into the realm of well-being or participating in the Hi How Are You Campaign, I hope you can hear in the following conversation how Juarez works to find a work-life balance amidst all he does.
Show Notes from the Conversation with Jorge Juarez
- The humble beginnings of Juarez that he often doesn’t share revealed at minute 1:58.
- What took Juarez back home to Corpus Christi and how a priest changed his life — and it’s not in the way you might expect.
- Where Juarez realized campus recreation was a career at minute 7:06.
- The journey he took around Texas in his professional portfolio.
- Set-backs and opportunities can be the same thing — it just depends on how you look at something.
- Juarez shares how he, his wife and their four kids made the decision to move to Arizona at 16:28.
- What it looks like to oversee four distinct campus recreation centers on a campus.
- Finding the work-life balance for Juarez looked like this early on at 24:11.
- Have you heard Juarez is moderating the 2023 Campus Rec Leadership Summit? Now you have.
- Why campus recreation has yet to reach its full potential at 27:36.
- Listen at 30:54 to Juarez’s shout out at East Carolina University’s well-being program and its director, Steven Trotter.
- The Hi How Are You campaign that ASU has participated in at 34:38 has been impactful.
- What Juarez loves about the Campus Rec Leadership Summit. Interested? Let us know here.
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