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Most Monday and Tuesday mornings, Kylie McNamara has a pass for an early dismissal.
After putting in 90 minutes of energy on the University of Hawaii practice field with the Rainbow Wahine soccer team, “KyMac” (as UH coach Michele Nagamine calls her) hustles over to Ma’ema’e Elementary School where she’ll walk into a classroom as simply “Miss McNamara.”
“It’s definitely pretty nerve wracking to be standing up in front of a class of kids, more than you’d think,” McNamara said of her duties as a student teacher as she pursues her degree in elementary education.
“Getting this experience now and getting comfortable, I’m so grateful for that.”
McNamara entered the fall semester with sporadic on-field experience in her first two seasons with the Rainbow Wahine. Now four years since joining the program as a walk-on, she’s settled into a starting role in the UH back line amid the bustle of juggling her soccer and academic schedules.
“We always tell the team to not limit themselves,” Nagamine said, “She has student teaching and she (says), ‘I’m going to be missing a lot of training.’ But I’m like, ‘Yeah, but you get to do everything you want to do.’
“You’re student teaching, you’re going to start your career, and you’re playing soccer at a high level. She’s a really good example of how athletics can make better people.”
McNamara is one of nine seniors/graduate students on the Rainbow Wahine roster who opened their final regular-season homestand against Cal State Bakersfield at Waipio Peninsula Soccer Stadium on Sunday.
McNamara was part of the UH freshman class in 2019, when the Wahine qualified for the Big West tournament for the first time in program history. The pandemic wiped out the 2020 season and a slow start to 2021 left the Wahine out of the top four spots in the conference.
The tournament was expanded to six teams this season and returning to the postseason has remained as the team’s target throughout the season.
“We’ve set this standard and I want to reach that again,” McNamara said. “Being able work hard and have a result come out of it is going to be huge for sure.”
McNamara didn’t see much field time during UH’s run to the tournament in 2019 after joining the program out of Logan High School in the Bay Area town of Union City, Calif.
This season, she’s worked her way into the starting lineup for eight matches and is approaching 700 minutes of playing time after recording 388 minutes in her first two seasons combined. All this despite suffering a broken wrist three days before the season opener. She played with a cast early in the season, which she has since replaced with a wrist brace.
“She’s like my inspiration,” senior forward Kelci Sumida said of the 5-foot-3 defender. “She always has a positive attitude, she always has a great work ethic and she’s someone I look up to. When I’m having a bad day, I just go to her and she instantly brings me up.”
McNamara maintains her energy throughout a daily schedule that begins with a predawn wakeup for the team’s 7 a.m. practices. On her teaching days, she’ll take off at 8:30 to get to the Maemae campus in Nuuanu, where she’ll aid in classrooms until the dismissal bell rings at 2:15 p.m.
Then it’s back to UH, sometimes for a solo weight training session to make up for training she missed earlier in the day. Then there’s the study required for the four classes on her schedule along with the student-teaching program.
She’ll sometimes add the routine to her Fridays to supplement her teaching hours after road trips.
“It is difficult, but the thing that really gets me going is the people I’m surrounding myself with,” McNamara said. “I make the effort to make connections with the people that are in my everyday environment because it makes the day more enjoyable for sure.
“If I was doing it all alone and there was no one I could enjoy it with, then it would definitely be way harder. But I love my teammates, I love my classmates, and I think those connections definitelyget me through the day.”
McNamara has a year of soccer eligibility remaining due to the 2020 pandemic cancellation, but she plans to finish out her playing career this fall, graduate in the spring, and embark on her teaching career.
While she’s following the timetable she laid out when she enrolled at UH, McNamara’s plan has changed a bit during her time in Hawaii.
“Originally I was thinking about moving back home as soon as I was done with my degree,” she said. “But my past three years of living here, I love it so much I want to stay and teach here for sure.”
When McNamara does start her career full-time, she’ll be in a position to impart her energy to the students in her classroom.
“She’s gonna be fantastic teacher,” Nagamine said. “I haven’t seen her one day in the classroom with her cohorts, but I know just because of her personality and the amount she cares and just that genuine energy she’s going to be a fantastic teacher, and those kids are going to be very lucky to have her.”
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