Advice and perseverance pay off

A master’s in physical
therapy helps a YSU student land a job before graduation.

YOUNGSTOWN — When Shingo Tanaka arrived in Youngstown in April 2000 and saw the Youngstown State University campus during the day, the first thing he asked was, “What are you feeding the chipmunks?”

It turned out that Tanaka, who now lives in Youngstown, was asking about the wrong animal. Because he comes from such a large city — Osaka, Japan, is the second-largest city in that country — he had never seen a squirrel before.

Tanaka graduated with a master’s degree in physical therapy Saturday at summer commencement in Beeghly Center.

Advice from his uncle

Before he came to YSU as an exercise science major, he was going to move to New Jersey with his uncle and go to school in that state. But his uncle advised him go to college in a smaller city and to investigate YSU’s exercise science program.

“He told me that if I really want to improve my English-speaking skills, I needed to live in a smaller city, without a large Japanese population, so I could really push myself to use English.”

He said that typically, Japanese students study English from 7th grade until first year of college, but that his parents, Shoko and Fumio Takana, speak no English.

Tanaka followed his advice, and six years later, he said one of the most important skills he learned at the university was how to speak English well. His uncle was also correct, Tanaka said, about the quality of the exercise science program, which led him to the physical therapy degree. He was admitted into physical therapy in May 2004.

He has already landed a full-time job in Boardman at Renaldi Physical Therapy.

But it wasn’t easy to earn the degree, learn English, assimilate into American culture and receive the job offer.

In addition to classes, he worked with the Athletic Department as a student trainer, traveling with the women’s basketball and volleyball teams. Then, when the Andrews Student Recreation and Wellness Center opened, he worked there until it was time to graduate. He also completed a graduate assistantship at the rec center, which he said helped him to prepare for his new job.

His mentors

Though he said he thought highly of all his professors at the university, those who served as his mentors were John Doneyko, associate athletic trainer, and Cathy Bieber Parrott, assistant professor of physical therapy.

He credited Bieber Parrot, who served as his faculty adviser, with assisting with the research paper he was required to write to graduate, titled, “Rehabilitation Program of Systemic Joint Pain with Manual Therapy.”

In addition the degree from YSU, the 30-year-old has a degree in pre-law from the Japanese university Kobe Gakuim. Takana said he was working on the pre-law degree because he wanted to be a police officer in Japan, but changed his mind when he took a personal training course at Kobe Gakuim.

He looked for a Japanese university that offered a four-year degree in his new field of interest, but could not find one. “My instructor told me to look in the United States — that this country’s universities offered the best programs in exercise and physical rehabilitation.”

His parents are planning to visit him in September. Since coming to the U.S., he’s returned to Japan a few times to visit them. He plans on staying in the U.S., but said eventually he will have to go back to Japan to help his parents. “Now they are healthy, but as they age, they will need me to help take care of them.”