TU student wins first Ocean City Beach Patrol alumni scholarship
Anthony Handle is an exercise science major, surf-rescue technician
By Megan Bradshaw on September 28, 2019
After graduating high school, Anthony Handle ’20 was ready to pick up the pace, so he entered the workforce directly, becoming a personal trainer.
But attending college wasn't too far from his thoughts; the southern Maryland native took community college classes occasionally before committing to academics fulltime after three years as a personal trainer.
Handle searched for a university that matched his personality and picked TU because he felt energized by its constantly evolving opportunities.
“TU has an established exercise science program,” he notes. “The energy around an expanding university like Towson is amazing. I’m around all these people working hard, and it makes me want to step up my game.”
Handle enjoyed the active lifestyle inherent in personal training and continued to find ways to pursue it at TU, choosing exercise science as a major and sampling many of the clubs the university offers, eventually narrowing his choices to jujitsu, Latin Dance Club and boxing.
Handle also decided to focus on his postgraduate plans: joining the Air Force.
“I was looking for an experience to mimic the military lifestyle and be in line with working in special operations,” he says. “ROTC wasn’t an option because of my time frame, so I thought about lifeguarding.”
Although he didn’t get into sports until a teenager and he self-identified as “not a strong swimmer” before last year, Handle trained every day through winter 2018 before attending the Ocean City Beach Patrol (OCBP) Academy in May.
He spent a total of 65 hours over eight days on the beach and in the classroom before joining Crew 5 as a surf rescue technician (SRT). There are 19 SRT crews that cover the beach from the boardwalk to 143rd Street.
Each day he woke at 7 a.m. and worked out on the beach before heading to his stand—between 20th and 27th Streets—by 10 a.m.
“Some days you get to the stand, look at the water currents and know you’re going to be busy,” says Handle. “SRTs are the first responders for the beach and the water, and we work closely with police, fire and EMT.”
Three million people visit Ocean City each summer, keeping lifeguards busy in and out of the water.
SRTs deal with heart attacks and health issues, drugs, domestic disturbances and family water safety in addition to potential drownings, Handle says.
Educating beachgoers on topics like bad weather and water currents was one of the tasks he enjoyed the most.
“Other SRTs sometimes felt like people should know these things,” he says. “But I thought, ‘Well, most of them are here for one week each year. We’re here all summer long.’”
True to form, Handle relished the physical demands and utility of his work; his busiest day included 14 rescues amid covering for other SRTs along his stretch of beach. He left each day at 5:30 p.m. and frequently volunteered to work on his two days off each week.
Ocean City Beach Patrol holds mandatory Monday staff meetings, and it was during the Labor Day Weekend meeting—in front of close to 200 staff—Handle found out he’d won the inaugural Ocean City Beach Patrol Alumni Association scholarship.
“The week before, two members of my crew won Crew Chief and Surf Rescue Technician of the Year awards, so I felt like I earned my spot in the crew,” says Handle.
The OCBP alumni association created the scholarship this year as a way to help newer guards with the financial burden of college. The one-time, $500 award can be used for books, fees or related costs.
MORE INFORMATION
Studying exercise science at TU
Greater awareness of disease prevention through increased physical activity, as well as an aged society, has created a robust job market for health care professionals with an exercise science background.
- Learn more about the exercise science major.
- Request information about Towson University.