Kaitlin (Russo) Loftus had a standout career for the Loyola women's tennis team from 2000-04, helping the Greyhounds win 77 matches during her tenure while reaching the NCAA Championships twice. At the time of her graduation, she was the co-holder of a pair of Greyhounds records for singles (28) and doubles (28) in a season, and she finished with a 75-37 career singles record.

After leaving Loyola, she spent a year using her business marketing degree before she moved into the education field as a member of the Baltimore City Teaching Residency. There, she combined her passion for sports and fitness with love for the children whom she taught. She participated in a campaign through Under Armour to increase the physical fitness level of her students, and through the competition she became an Under Armour brand ambassador.

She has stepped away from the classroom to raise her three children, but tennis remains a huge part of her life as she teaches lessons in nearby Bel Air, Maryland.

Learn more about Loftus in this Alumni Spotlight presented by Butterball:

How did you become involved in playing tennis, and at what point did you get "hooked" on the sport?
 
I've been playing tennis since age 4. Much of my childhood was spent at a pool and tennis club in town, and my summers consisted of a constant back and forth between sharks and minnows, tennis clinics, swim team and tennis team. When I wasn't at the club, I was hitting tennis balls against my garage for hours on end with Ace of Base blasting out of my boom box. I grew up admiring Jennifer Capriati and declared in my fourth-grade autobiography that I was going to be a professional tennis player when I grew up.
 
What drew you to Loyola as a student-athlete?
 
There were many reasons why I chose Loyola. I liked that it was far from home (Connecticut) but not far enough to have to take a flight. I liked that it was "south" and a good 10 degrees warmer than home. I liked the size of Loyola and that it was near a city. But, the icing on the cake for me was the tennis team. I really felt comfortable speaking with Rick (McClure), our coach. After a recruit trip where I spent the night on campus, met Loyola kids and was introduced to all of the fun in Fells Point, I knew it was a match for me.
 
What are some standout moments you have from being a part of the Loyola women's tennis program?
 
The best part of Loyola tennis was the lifelong friendships I made. We roomed together on campus and two of the girls were in my wedding. A highlight of our Loyola tennis career was definitely when we won MAAC's (the Metro Atlantic Athletic Conference) and qualified for the NCAA Championships my freshman year. We flew to California, explored the area and played the University of California, Berkeley. It was an experience of a lifetime.
 
After graduation, what was your initial career path, and what took you there?
 
Upon graduating, I worked at Thompson Prometric in Fells Point. I had a marketing degree but found myself so bored and not challenged in my job that was basically answering phones and taking orders for testing vouchers. Nine months into my job, I stumbled upon the Baltimore City Teaching Residency, spent six weeks in summer training sessions and started as a first-year teacher in the fall of 2005 while getting my Masters in Education at Johns Hopkins.
 
While working as a Baltimore City school teacher, you became an advocate for girls' physical fitness. What was a driving point to get involved in this?
 
Exercise has always been a huge part of my life, and I feel as though it really shaped who I've become as an adult. I think sports and fitness are so much more than just keeping your body healthy. They also teach perseverance, determination, dedication, teamwork, etc. When I was teaching in Baltimore CIty, I learned that I was so privileged to have access to all of the sports and programs that I had as a kid and that is not the case for everyone. Most of my students were not involved in sports after school and instead had a lot of idle time.
 
How did you become involved with the Under Armour What's Beautiful campaign? Take us through what that entailed and the steps that you were involved in?
 
In the spring of 2012, Under Armour ran a campaign called What's Beautiful. It challenged participants to create a goal and document your progress towards achieving this goal over the course of two months. Then they would choose the winners and decide who would become Under Armour ambassadors. I immediately thought of my students and realized that this could be a really cool opportunity to introduce them to a world of fitness and girl power. With my principal's ok, I trained 40 different girls in grades 3-5 for 45 minutes each afternoon. As practices went on, they improved their health, turned in their homework more often because they didn't want to have to miss practice, fought less because we became more of a team, and they had a lot of fun. In the end, 42 girls and a few of their moms ran their first mile with the entire school cheering them on. We had banners and blow horns and medals and huge, proud, sweaty grins in the end. And about a month later, Under Armour announced that I was one of the winners of the competition. I won over $5,000 worth of free gear, a yoga and surfing retreat in Costa Rica with the other winners and several years of an Under Armour ambassador title
 
Since then, where has life taken you?
 
On the same day I found out that I won the UA competition, I also found out that I was pregnant with my first child. I've since had three kids in all, Madelyn (7), Colton (5) and Matthew (4). I completed 10 years teaching in Baltimore City and am now in my fifth year of staying at home with my kids, and I am so grateful to be able to do this. Now that my husband (also a Greyhound) is working from home because of COVID-19, and my kids are big enough that they don't need to be watched every single second, I recently started teaching tennis lessons in town. Word of mouth spread pretty fast and for most of the fall, I was working around 15 hours a week which really was the perfect little side gig. We live in Bel Air, Maryland, and have a really great group of Loyola friends in the area.