Dr. Kirk Brumels, associate professor of kinesiology and program director of athletic training education at Hope College, will be inducted into the Hall of Fame of the Michigan Athletic Trainers’ Society (MATS) on Friday, June 7.
The ceremony will be held in Ypsilanti, during the society’s annual Hall of Fame Dinner.
Brumels, a certified member of the National Athletic Trainers’ Association and licensed Michigan athletic trainer, has been a member of the Hope faculty since 2001. He had previously spent more than a decade as an athletic trainer with the New England Patriots.
He has been active with MATS in a variety of ways, including as president during 2011 and 2012, president-elect in 2009-10, and as chair of the Professional Education Committee during 2007 and 2008. His current involvement includes serving as Michigan state representative to the Great Lakes Athletic Trainers’ Association (GLATA).
In addition to teaching and serving as head athletic trainer at Hope, Brumels conducts research in athletic training, including collaboratively with students at the college. His publications include co-authoring the fourth edition of the textbook “Developing Clinical Proficiency in Athletic Training: A Modular Approach” and co-authoring nine chapters in the textbook “Core Concepts in Athletic Training and Therapy,” as well as numerous articles in scholarly journals. Through the years, he has made multiple presentations on his research or aspects of athletic training during MATS, GLATA, and the NATA Annual Meetings and/or Symposiums.
A 1988 graduate of Hope’s athletic training program, Brumels worked with the college’s basketball, baseball, field hockey and football teams as well as in the athletic training room as a student. His undergraduate experiences also included an internship with the Patriots during the summer before his senior year.
After Hope he did graduate work in athletic training at Western Michigan University, completing his master’s in 1990. While in the master’s program he was also the staff athletic trainer at St. Mary’s Sports Med Center in Grand Rapids. He completed his doctorate at Western Michigan University in 2005.
He worked with the New England Patriots in Foxboro, Mass., from 1990 to 2001. His responsibilities included supervising, educating and coordinating student athletic trainers during summer training camp and various internship positions throughout the football season. He also worked with the team physician and head athletic trainer to coordinate all aspects of medical services for the team and its staff.
MATS is a not-for-profit organization formed to assist its members and to educate the public on the role of a certified athletic trainer (ATC) within the health care profession. The society consists of certified athletic trainers, non-certified athletic training students and other health care professionals.