Inaugural P22 Education Grant Recipients Begin their Journeys

On Saturday night, Angel City headquarters hosted a panel discussion featuring four retired elite female athletes, who discussed their career paths after sports. The audience consisted of local business and nonprofit leaders and retired professional athletes—including the three recipients of the 2023 P22 Education Grant, the inaugural class for that branch of the program as P22’s scope and reach expands in its second year.

The three participants were all current or former professional women's soccer players. The panel was the kickoff event to the Athletes Redefined Program, created by Ethos Mentality Group and its founder, Shannon Boxx. P22 grant recipients got to participate in the two-day Athletes Redefined workshop, which focuses on empowering athletes to find or create their own authentic path and equip them with the tools necessary to be successful beyond their sport.

The P22 education grant is partially funded through ACFC's partnership with ComfyGo and the club’s unique 10% sponsorship model, where 10% of each sponsorship is directed towards supporting community impact efforts.

“It made me feel very hopeful for the path forward,” said Kelly Conheeney, one of the participants. “You can take your skills that you have and they can apply to all different types of work,” she continued.

The four panelists all had very different athletic careers and post-sport trajectories. Mónica Gerardo, a former Notre Dame and Mexico Women’s National Team player, is now a school principal. Ronnie Fair Sullins, who played for Stanford and the USWNT, is a surgeon and faculty member at UCLA Medical (she’s also an ACFC investor). Boxx, ACFC investor and founder of Ethos Mentality Group, had a 12-year, 195-cap career with the USWNT; she now also works as an on-air analyst and leadership coach. Finally, Jenné Blackburn, who played volleyball at Baylor, is an author and the founder of Always an Athlete LLC.

All four shared an experience Sullins summed up succinctly: “When [the soccer path] sort of closed so suddenly,” she said, “[It] was like, ‘oh my God, what am I going to do now?’”

That feeling—and the lack of existing resources for former pros contending with it—is what inspired the P22 program. Retirement is an especially challenging moment for athletes in women’s sports, who historically have made much less money than their male counterparts. But as the Athletes Redefined panelists demonstrated, elite athletes have skills that position them for the professional world in a unique way. 

“I thought it was really amazing how diverse the panelists were,” said Sabrina Flores, another of the three participants. “Everyone had a totally different path or story and are now involved in different things. That was really helpful—instead of [seeing] the same type of person that came up through the same type of system and now is doing the same types of things.”

A major theme of the discussion was the question of identity: how retiring players don’t have to stop identifying themselves with the sport they’ve loved for decades in order to find success outside it.

“Everyone has always said to me, ‘you can't let being like a soccer player define you,’” said Flores. “And I'm like, ‘What do you mean? Soccer has been my whole life and now I’m supposed to separate myself from it?’”

That identity “is always a part of you,” said Gerardo. “It [fades], but it's always going to be with you… sport played such an impactful part of all of our lives that it's kind of hard to just pretend it didn't happen. So I think it's just a matter of taking those bits and pieces and utilizing them in whatever your current life is.”

From left to right: Jenné Blackburn, Shannon Boxx, Ronnie Fair Sullins, Mónica Gerardo, and facilitator Lisa Gardner.

That view was validating for Flores, who added, “Soccer being a main part of their lives isn’t a bad thing. That's really what's propelled them to do great things. That's what I've always felt inside, but hearing them say that is really cool.”

The panelists also shared how they grew through aspects of their athletic backgrounds that haven’t been helpful outside of sports. 

“When I left the game, I was still trying to be that perfect person,” said Boxx. “Everybody told me, ‘Whatever you do next, you're going to be great at it.’ I was so scared that I didn't know how to do anything else, [so] how was I going to be great at it? That was really hard for me to get through, because I didn't want to start anything. I was afraid. I kept saying no to all these things that were options for me until finally I [decided], I have to stop trying to be perfect. I have to let myself take some risks and step forward and just start.”

“It really resonated with me when Shannon was talking about that perfectionist mentality that deterred her from going after things,” said Conheeney. “Because I felt like that too. I had an opportunity to go back to school and have it be paid for, but I wasn’t in a place where I was confident enough to go for that. So I feel like I'm recovering in a way. This period of my life is about just trying things and seeing what sticks.”

The panelists all emphasized that there’s no one path after retirement, and that it’s not only okay, but crucial, to try things that might not pan out. 

“They were so empowering that I could see myself in their shoes in five or ten years, speaking on my journey,” said Flores.

“It really does feel like a gift,” Conheeney said. She gestured at an Angel City flag and laughed, “something that I've been given from the angels.”