The PROFile

Glen Bergeron

Photo by Simeon Rusnak

Acting Dean, Gupta Faculty of Kinesiology and Applied Health

 

“I’ll be with you in a moment, just need to finish an email,” Dr. Glen Bergeron says from his office treadmill. 

Bergern uses a laptop placed on top of his treadmill with the screen projected on to the wall, and he can comfortably walk on the treadmill and respond to emails at the same time. Both the meeting table and computer desk in his office are standing-friendly as well. 

It should be no surprise that Bergeron is a professor in kinesiology, the scientific study of human movement, and the dean of the Gupta Faculty of Kinesiology and Applied Health at the University of Winnipeg. 

Bergeron has been teaching for 40 years and has served as the head athletic therapist and director of athletic therapy at the U of W and the University of Manitoba respectively. 

“While I was doing my bachelors degree in physical education at University of Manitoba, I was introduced to athletic therapy by Gordon Mackie. He was the head therapist there and a legend in Manitoba. It was my first experience of how I could combine my love for sport and my love for rehabilitation,” he says. 

He went on to become an athletic therapist at five Olympics and many world championships. His work has seen him treat famous athletes such as Ben Johnson, Todd MacCulloch for the Canadian men’s national hockey team at the 1988 Winter Olympics in Calgary. 

At the Olympics, athletic therapists try to create an environment where the athletes can perform at their very best. 

“We don’t try and do any major heroics. We just try and make sure that on that day, they are the best they can be,” Bergeron says. 

Bergeron still does clinical athletic therapy even though he’s the acting dean. He enjoys working with patients as well as working with students to teach them to become better clinicians.

 

AGE: 63. 

AREA OF RESEARCH: Concussions and sports injuries. 

NUMBER OF PEER-REVIEWED PUBLICATIONS: I started really late, so I probably have six or seven. 

BEST FIVE MINUTES OF YOUR DAY: Any time I get to interact with people. 

LOWEST GRADE IN UNIVERSITY: Probably a C somewhere. 

MEANING OF LIFE IN SHORT: A sense of purpose and making a difference. 

STUDENT PET PEEVE: A lack of awareness to how their learning will apply to their future career. 

BATTING AVERAGE: Probably .250. 

FAVOURITE BAND: The Guess Who.

Published in Volume 70, Number 18 of The Uniter (February 4, 2016)

Related Reads