If sports and fitness are your greatest passions, then a profession in these fields would surely give you much fulfillment. Aside from the challenge you’ll get, nothing beats doing what you love best. However, before you embark in this profession, you know that you should be certified and licensed. Passion and skill aren’t enough to get you the profession that you want; you need license from authorized bodies. It is in this endeavor that the National Academy of Sports Medicine (NASM) can help you.
An Overview of NASM
NASM is a National Commission for Certifying Agencies (NCCA)-certified organization that awards personal trainer certification to people who want a career in fitness and sports, improving their credentials in the field. It also offers education to trainers who handle athletes. It aims to empower sports professionals to enable them to empower their clients in return. Additionally, it also offers bachelors and masters degree programs, as well as home study courses and continuing education.
The Certifications Offered by NASM
The organization primarily offers the Certified Personal Trainer (CPT) Certification. This is ideal for personal trainers, for those who operate health clubs and gyms, for health professionals, and sports institutions. This certification will help a person get into prestigious and top sports and health clubs and boost an organization’s credentials to bring in more clients.
Aside from this certification, the organization also offers the following specializations:
- Performance Enhancement. This is designed for people who handle athlete of all levels, from beginners to advanced ones. This allows a personal trainer to come up with programs tailored to the needs of the athlete, programs that can bring their performance at its best.
- Corrective Exercise / Injury Prevention. This advanced specialization focuses on movement-related science like imbalance and injury prevention and recovery. Trainers with this specialization are seen as more advanced in their field and are therefore look up on when it comes to knowledge and skills.
More Benefits
Other than all these, NASM offers a lot more. First, it conducts live workshops in various cities in the United States. These workshops are conducted for a few days and they provide hands-on training and experience. Some examples are workshop on personal fitness and workshop for corrective exercise. Access to these is now easier with the site’s eLearning center, which allows people to schedule into their preferred workshop or switch out in case they can’t attend the workshop they signed up on.
The organization also has an online store for those who are looking for printable or downloadable training manuals, online courses, and weight loss and weight gain plans, among others. Most of those offered in the store already come in a bundle or package, saving time among shoppers.
So if you plan to get into a career in fitness and sports, or if you are already in the field but you need a boost in your credentials, you can turn to the National Academy of Sports Medicine. There are a lot of resources that you’ll find in the site: online practice exams, webinars, study guides, textbooks, and a lot more—some of which are free while some others come with a fee.