Associate Professor of Clinical Physical Therapy and Director of the Master’s in Biokinesiology Programs Susan Sigward PhD ’04 let her natural inquisitiveness lead her to a career of teaching future generations of movement experts.

BY MICHELLE McCARTHY

SUSAN SIGWARD PhD ’04  NEVER MAPPED OUT A CAREER that would lead her to directing USC’s master’s programs in biokinesiology.

Instead, the longtime faculty member followed questions that interested her — and remained willing to pivot when new opportunities emerged.

Sigward began her career as a physical therapist working in orthopedics and sports medicine. Seeking greater opportunities in sports medicine, she earned an athletic training certification and later a master’s degree in anatomy while continuing to practice.

“I loved learning about the human body and incorporating that into my practice,” she says. That curiosity eventually led her to pursue her PhD in biokinesiology at USC.

USC was particularly attractive because Sigward wanted to study lower-extremity injuries at a time when researchers were becoming increasingly interested in why female athletes experienced anterior cruciate ligament (ACL) tears more frequently.

The Division’s Musculoskeletal Biomechanics Research Laboratory was conducting investigations into that area, providing the ever-inquisitive Sigward an opportunity to study movement mechanics that might place female athletes at risk for ACL injury.

Building a Career Through Curiosity

After earning her PhD in 2004, Sigward completed a postdoctoral fellowship in biomechanics with UCLA’s Department of Orthopaedic Surgery. She eventually returned to USC, drawn by the professional community she had become part of — and by the city itself.

“I just love Los Angeles,” she says of her decision to remain in Southern Calfornia. “I love the diversity. I love the grit. I love the beauty.”

Those connections proved important as Sigward built her research career. Rather than following the traditional tenure-track route, she joined USC as a clinical faculty member and relied on collaborations she had developed throughout the region to continue her research.

Today, Sigward is an associate professor of clinical physical therapy and serves as director of USC’s master’s program in biokinesiology and the master’s program in biokinesiology with a sports science emphasis. She also teaches two biomechanics courses and musculoskeletal anatomy, helping direct the cadaver laboratory for DPT students.

She especially enjoys teaching anatomy because it pushes students to move beyond memorization and think three-dimensionally about the human body.

“It quite literally is the foundation,” she says. “To understand how to fix the body, you have to understand the body.”

Students learn from multiple donors, allowing them to see a range of anatomical variations while developing the problem-solving and spatial reasoning essential to clinical practice.

Opening Doors for the Next Generation

Sigward is equally enthusiastic about the future of biokinesiology. Wearable technologies can increasingly capture movement outside laboratories, while new streams of data and more sophisticated analytical approaches offer researchers opportunities to reconsider what they know about effective human movement.

Among Sigward’s most significant accomplishments at USC is the master of biokinesiology program’s sports science emphasis. Combining clinical reasoning with science, engineering, technology, data and human performance, the program provides students with experiential opportunities in professional sports and industry.

“The reputation of the students coming out of our program and the strength of what we have built is really opening doors for them,” she says. “That’s what I am really proud of.”

Her advice to students reflects the path of her own career: Have aspirations, but remain open to possibilities you can’t anticipate.

For Sigward, a career shaped by curiosity was less about making dramatic pivots than recognizing which opportunities were worth pursuing. Each experience built on the one before it, eventually leading her somewhere she never could have planned.

“I had no idea that I wanted to be here,” Sigward says. “I figured it out along the way.”