Editor's Note: Some quotes in this story were changed for clarity.
The term "student athlete" is a phrase used at major college sports programs around the country. The expression means every competitor is a student first and an athlete second. That couldn’t be more true for head coach Penny Jernigan and Western Michigan gymnastics.
Jernigan, who took over the team six years ago, has taken what she has learned from 18 years at the University of North Carolina and transferred it to Kalamazoo. So far in her tenure the team has never had a year where the team GPA has dipped to under 3.