Maggie Beem, a Truman graduate student and assistant soccer coach, is entering her third and final year working with the team as she finishes her studies to graduate with two master’s degrees in English and Education.
In 2020, Maggie graduated from Truman with a Bachelor’s Degree in Exercise Science after playing on the soccer team her entire four years, and now she gets to continue working with the team that Beem said has helped her grow so much while finishing the education that will allow her to pursue her dream.
“I really want to coach and teach. Coaching is what I really love. That’s what I want to do every day for work,” Beem said.
For a year after graduating from Truman, Beem worked as the head coach for a middle school soccer team, which she led to the league championship game.
“We had a minimal amount of kids who even knew how to play soccer [going in]. Most of the girls had never touched a soccer ball before,” Beem said. “We lost 2-1 but scored first on an undefeated team. It was a great feeling because I was the head and only coach, so I realized that these kids actually listened to me.”
After a year coaching in Kansas City, where Beem is from, she returned to Truman to work towards her master’s in English and Education and began working as the assistant coach for the women’s soccer team.
“Maggie is in charge of all of the weightlifting and conditioning that the players do throughout the year, in and out of season, and she has just really been a Godsend for us,” Mike Cannon, head women’s soccer coach, said.
“Before Maggie, we had a lot of turnover with the assistant coaches. We would be lucky if [a coach] stayed longer than a year, but we have been lucky enough to have Maggie for three years,” Cannon said.
Along with working on the nutrition, strength, conditioning, and offensive drills with the girls on the team, Maggie is also there to be an outlet for them if they are having external problems and to facilitate a lot of team bonding.
“She knows me, and she played for me, and she was a great striker, so she really knows how to help the girls,” Cannon said.
“Having someone who has been through your experience before can be very helpful. I am there to show them that there is no ceiling, you can keep getting better, and that, as an athlete who didn’t have a starting spot freshman year but ended up playing a lot later in college, your hard work will eventually pay off,” Beem said.
Being a great support system for the team means being there for them and being an outlet if they are having problems, but it also means making sure that the team is performing to the best of its ability and everyone is working hard and towards the same goal.
“She has a great sense of humor and has a lot of fun, but she is also fierce about getting better. She is very open-minded and sees the big picture and works a lot with the girls to help them always be improving,” Cannon said.
Cannon said that the team loves having Maggie around and she really helps to get the best out of them.
“I have always been super competitive with myself. I want to always be getting better. It is a great feeling when you put so much energy, time, and effort into something, and it pays off,” Beem said.
Through all of the challenges, successes, hard work, and accomplishments that Truman has given her, Beem said there is no place she would have rather spent these last three years coaching, even if it wasn’t what she had initially planned
“I never thought that I would still be living in Kirksville or that I would have been given the chance to coach a college team. Somebody was looking out for me. The opportunities and successes and failures have all been so important for me,” Beem said. “A perfect storm led me to Truman, and I ended up loving it, and it has been really good for me.”