NASPSPA Student Representative Election

Hello fellow NASPSPA members! My name is Stephanie Fuller, and I am a second-year PhD student at East Carolina University in Bioenergetics and Exercise Science, supervised by Dr. Thomas D. Raedeke. Prior to pursuing a career in academia, I was a physical education/health teacher, coach, and athletic director. These experiences shaped my research interests in social influences in sport and their impact on athletes. Ultimately, I aim to improve adolescent sport experiences by gaining a deeper understanding of the motivational climates promoted by parents, coaches, and peers.

I have served in NASPSPA leadership roles as a student ambassador at the 2023, 2024, and 2025 annual conferences. Currently, I am a member of the NASPSPA Student Advisory Council and the NASPSPA Social Media Team. These roles have allowed me to collaborate with executive board members and prepared me to serve effectively as student representative.

If elected, I will build upon the work of past representatives to strengthen year-round communication and expand opportunities for student engagement with faculty and professionals throughout the year, keeping our community accessible and connected beyond the annual conference. I will also promote pre-conference connections to create a more meaningful and cohesive conference experience for all.

My background in K-12 physical education and graduate training in Adventure Education and Sport and Exercise Psychology have equipped me with a strong understanding of group dynamics and collaborative leadership. I would be honored to leverage these experiences to represent NASPSPA’s student membership in this role.

Hi!  I am Juliet Leyva and I am a Kinesiology graduate student from California State University, Fullerton. My current research focus is on early motor development and understanding the effects of infant/caregiver dyads on movement. Broadly, I am interested in how locomotion and socioeconomic contexts can shape learning, exploration through environmental affordances, and social engagement. I am also interested in learning about sleep’s effect on developmental growth and motor learning in both typical development and individual populations.

I am very drawn to how infants can observe and learn from the world around them. I believe that early motor development and learning is a powerful tool that can be shaped to build the future of our society.

Through my academic and research journey, mentorship and community has been a central theme. I value environments that support curious individuals so that they might be able to explore their questions, seek new thought processes, and collaboration is encouraged. To me, this type of environment is found thriving within our society. It has created an integral community that helps us ground our science in both rigor and humility.

With that, I am so grateful for the opportunity to run for NASPSPA 2026 Student Representative on the Board of Directors. I hope to continue to foster this growing community and continue to support its effort in outreaching to new generations of scientists. My goal is to bring more scientists together across disciplines and help new ideas flourish in new areas of conversation. Thank you so much for your consideration.