National Collegiate Rugby has announced that it has entered into a partnership with Go4Ellis, a national, on-demand platform for hiring per diem Athletic Trainers. 

Go4Ellis is a Preferred Provider of the NATA (National Athletic Trainers’ Association). Their website is https://go4ellis.com/.

This arrangement will provide teams from NCR member colleges access to thousands of certified athletic trainers for on-site medical care and injury prevention services for matches, practices, and tournaments across the country. 

“Such arrangements play an important part in the success of our organization by providing a valuable resource to our our members and—most importantly— serving the welfare and safety of the players,” said NCR CEO and President Steve Cohen. With some college teams, especially those under their college's club sports departments, having trouble finding qualified trainers, this service gives those teams an option.

“ATs are such a valuable resource for players and teams to help them perform at their best," said Brian Murray, the marketing director for Go4Ellis. "This is definitely a service I wish we had back when I played. I ended up playing most of a season with a torn pec because we didn’t have ATs on the sideline handling or diagnosing injuries.”

In the near future, Go4Ellis will be holding a series of webinars with NCR Conference Commissioners and Club Administrators on how to operate the platform, services provided athletic trainers, and platform best practices. 

Go4Ellis was started by NXTsports, a youth sports education and event management company based out of Philadelphia that specializes in youth lacrosse events. It was through NXT working to staff every event with athletic trainers that it started to develop its network of trainers available to work other events. Ellis Mair, EdM, ATC, is the director of participant health and safety for NXTsports and the Go4Ellis platform is named after Mair's habit of answering his phone by saying "Go for Ellis."