For those of you old enough to remember the debate over single-sex education, and how VMI fought to remain an all-male institution, you’ll recall that a number of prominent women joined that fight. While producing a 1993 documentary about the value of single-sex institutions, I interviewed a number of highly successful women, all of who had either attended or managed an all-female college. Cynthia Tyson, then president of Mary Baldwin College told me, “Women increase in their self-esteem in a single-sex institution, and that leads to higher achievement for them when they go out into the world of work.” Others, like attorney Anita Blair, told me that girls and young women have different developmental needs from those of boys. Several years ago, former Girl Scout CEO Lane Cook told me that those developmental differences still exist, saying, “Girls thrive in an all-girl-led environment.”
The bottom line is that girls and young women still need and deserve to be led by strong female role models. It’s why an increasing number of companies now support STEM programs and activities just for girls, such as Inmar’s girls’ robotics team. It’s why Big Brothers, Big Sisters still recruits adult females to mentor young girls. Yet with all the emphasis on nurturing girls, our society is falling short when it comes to women’s sports.
Who’s the most successful coach in women’s college basketball? A man. Who did Greensboro College just hire to coach women’s soccer? A man. But wait a minute. Didn’t Title IX make things better? Just the opposite according to a 2019 report by The Institute for Diversity and Ethics and Sports (TIDES). In 1972, just prior to Title IX, “women held 90% of the head coaching positions for women’s teams.” But as big money started pouring into women’s sports, more male coaches were attracted to the salaries being paid to lead women’s teams. As a result, TIDES reports that today, women now hold less than half (40.8%) of the head coaching jobs for women’s teams. That figure improves to 61% if you only count Division 1 teams, but it still raises the question: Why aren’t ALL women’s teams coached by women?
Speaking at a 2017 Digital Leadership Summit for Women in Sports, Holly Warlick, former University of Tennessee women’s basketball coach said, “We’ve got to understand that there’s a lot of women who are not coaching that are really, really good…a lot of young kids coming out right now, I think, will make great coaches. But it’s hard to get in. We gotta give them that opportunity.”
Perhaps the way to improve the odds on those opportunities is for the NCAA to adopt a variation of the NFL’s Rooney Rule, where college athletic directors would be required to interview and seriously consider a woman for every job opening in women’s sports.
And while the hiring situation among the college ranks is disturbing, I am also alarmed by the dearth of women coaching youth sports. I recently corresponded with Alex Kerman with the Sports and Fitness Industry Association, and he confirmed that of the 6.3 million adults who coach youth teams up to age 14, only 30.7% are women. But how can this be in an era when the public and private sectors alike are touting the importance of adult female role models for girls? There is no empirical evidence to back me up, but I have to believe that just as young women can benefit from female mentors in STEM programs, so can they also benefit from female leadership in sports. That’s why I encourage women to volunteer to coach local youth sports teams, and why I urge the NCAA to adopt a proactive stance on the hiring of women as head coaches for women’s teams. Girls interested in athletics at all levels deserve to be coached by someone who looks like them and understands their developmental needs.
Female Leadership Needed in Female Sports
For those of you old enough to remember the debate over single-sex education, and how VMI fought to remain an all-male institution, you’ll recall that a number of prominent women joined that fight. While producing a 1993 documentary about the value of single-sex institutions, I interviewed a number of highly successful women, all of who had either attended or managed an all-female college. Cynthia Tyson, then president of Mary Baldwin College told me, “Women increase in their self-esteem in a single-sex institution, and that leads to higher achievement for them when they go out into the world of work.” Others, like attorney Anita Blair, told me that girls and young women have different developmental needs from those of boys. Several years ago, former Girl Scout CEO Lane Cook told me that those developmental differences still exist, saying, “Girls thrive in an all-girl-led environment.”
The bottom line is that girls and young women still need and deserve to be led by strong female role models. It’s why an increasing number of companies now support STEM programs and activities just for girls, such as Inmar’s girls’ robotics team. It’s why Big Brothers, Big Sisters still recruits adult females to mentor young girls. Yet with all the emphasis on nurturing girls, our society is falling short when it comes to women’s sports.
Who’s the most successful coach in women’s college basketball? A man. Who did Greensboro College just hire to coach women’s soccer? A man. But wait a minute. Didn’t Title IX make things better? Just the opposite according to a 2019 report by The Institute for Diversity and Ethics and Sports (TIDES). In 1972, just prior to Title IX, “women held 90% of the head coaching positions for women’s teams.” But as big money started pouring into women’s sports, more male coaches were attracted to the salaries being paid to lead women’s teams. As a result, TIDES reports that today, women now hold less than half (40.8%) of the head coaching jobs for women’s teams. That figure improves to 61% if you only count Division 1 teams, but it still raises the question: Why aren’t ALL women’s teams coached by women?
Speaking at a 2017 Digital Leadership Summit for Women in Sports, Holly Warlick, former University of Tennessee women’s basketball coach said, “We’ve got to understand that there’s a lot of women who are not coaching that are really, really good…a lot of young kids coming out right now, I think, will make great coaches. But it’s hard to get in. We gotta give them that opportunity.”
Perhaps the way to improve the odds on those opportunities is for the NCAA to adopt a variation of the NFL’s Rooney Rule, where college athletic directors would be required to interview and seriously consider a woman for every job opening in women’s sports.
And while the hiring situation among the college ranks is disturbing, I am also alarmed by the dearth of women coaching youth sports. I recently corresponded with Alex Kerman with the Sports and Fitness Industry Association, and he confirmed that of the 6.3 million adults who coach youth teams up to age 14, only 30.7% are women. But how can this be in an era when the public and private sectors alike are touting the importance of adult female role models for girls? There is no empirical evidence to back me up, but I have to believe that just as young women can benefit from female mentors in STEM programs, so can they also benefit from female leadership in sports. That’s why I encourage women to volunteer to coach local youth sports teams, and why I urge the NCAA to adopt a proactive stance on the hiring of women as head coaches for women’s teams. Girls interested in athletics at all levels deserve to be coached by someone who looks like them and understands their developmental needs.