The NCAA News - News and Features

The NCAA News -- November 22, 1999

Summit strives to turn possibilities into realities

Prominent groups gather to enhance opportunities for minority women in intercollegiate athletics

BY GARY T. BROWN
STAFF WRITER

DALLAS -- Leaders from eight major sports organizations convened November 9 to address a constituency they feel doesn't get the attention it deserves: minority women.

The NCAA Summit on Athletics Opportunities for Minority Women, the first of its kind, enjoined prominent individuals from advocacy groups in a forum designed to initiate change.

"The NCAA has committees to shepherd interests for both minorities and for women," said Charles Whitcomb, faculty athletics representative at San Jose State University. "But there's a potential for some issues relating specifically to minority women to go unaddressed. This summit will go a long way toward remedying that."

Whitcomb, as chair of the NCAA Minority Opportunities and Interests Committee (MOIC), and Cheryl L. Levick, chair of the NCAA Committee on Women's Athletics (CWA), conducted the summit with the help of a professional facilitator. The roster of 19 attendees included representatives from the National Association of Collegiate Women Athletic Administrators, the Women's Basketball Coaches Association, the United States Olympic Committee, the Women's Sports Foundation, the Black Women in Sports Foundation, the Black Coaches Association and the National Association of Girls and Women in Sport. Members representing several NCAA committees also attended.

"This was a historic occasion," said Levick, senior associate director of athletics at Stanford University. "We had a very diverse group of leaders in the room but they were unified for a common cause. This could serve as a prototype for other NCAA coalitions in the future."

The summit was the product of a joint recommendation from the MOIC and CWA, which agreed that the issue of opportunities for minority women needed special attention. Data from the NCAA's 1997-98 race demographics report, in fact, indicate that just under 2 percent of all athletics administrators are minority women (historically black colleges and universities excluded). Minority women do not fare much better in the coaching ranks, accounting for only 2.2 percent of nearly 7,000 head coaches. Additionally, minority women are not well represented on the fields and courts, with most of the small percentage of minority women student-athletes concentrated just in the sports of basketball and track.

Suggested action

The summit addressed the challenge with full-group and breakout brainstorming sessions that produced a litany of possible solutions. Primary on the agenda was developing national policies and programs that could increase opportunities for minority women in all sports, as well as in coaching, officiating and athletics administration. By the end of the meeting, the group had proposed a list of suggested action plans ranging from the development of grants for creating new opportunities to the enhancement of existing programs, and drafting incentive-based legislation to establishing disincentive possibilities for noncompliance.

One example that was discussed was the idea of a reward system similar to one under consideration from the Division I Working Group to Study Basketball Issues. The basketball group's proposal links the number of grants-in-aid awarded to graduation rates; the summit participants discussed the possibility of linking scholarships and jobs for minority women to financial incentives.

The panel also discussed the possibility of regional seminars or clinics not only to train potential minority women candidates for athletics positions but to provide cross-management training for existing minority women employees for advancement opportunities. The newly created Executive Committee Subcommittee on Gender and Ethnicity Issues already has endorsed a similar proposal.

The group also addressed identification of particular sports for increased minority female participation. Programs such as the NCAA's Youth Education through Sports were identified as possibilities for encouraging grass-roots growth. Increasing grants-in-aid specifically for minority women also was discussed.

"The summit was all about ideas," Levick said. "It's important to note that all of the suggestions are preliminary. It will be up to each organization and various NCAA committees to bring some practical application to those ideas."

Budget impact

It also will be up to those groups to attach a budget figure to the proposals and to properly introduce them into the NCAA's governance structure. Levick said that the Committee on Women's Athletics and the Minority Opportunities and Interests Committee will be pivotal in distilling the ideas and forming partnerships with the affiliated organizations in order to bring proposals to the NCAA governance table.

A draft of summit actions will be distributed within the next few weeks asking each organization represented at the summit for comments. From there, subcommittees from both the MOIC and CWA will meet to determine a plan for introducing any action items into the 2000-01 budget cycle.

"The two NCAA committees are the primary ball carriers from this point," Levick said. "But it will be important for each organization represented at the summit to develop its own action plan. There are some programs that can be expanded, or new programs that can be developed, without depending exclusively on the NCAA for dollars or programming."

Levick added, however, that pending the availability of funds, grants could be provided to other organizations or to national governing bodies to help initiate or enhance existing minority programs.

Some of the existing programs the panel pointed to as ways to increase minority women opportunities were the NCAA Fellows program, the NCAA Ethnic Minority and Women's Enhancement Scholarship program, and the National Association of Collegiate Women Athletic Administrators HERS program.

"A lot of this is just making sure people know there are programs out there that can benefit them," Whitcomb said. "For example, we send thousands of enhancement scholarship applications to schools each year but typically receive only about 100 nominations."

Whitcomb also emphasized to the group that this was not just an NCAA initiative. To make a difference, he said, a collective effort would be necessary.

"It's not enough that the NCAA buys in," he said. "We need the same kind of buy-in from each organization because they are the conscience of the NCAA. We can't walk away from this summit and think the job is done. On the contrary, the job is just beginning."

Whitcomb and Levick anticipate that once the proposals are developed and refined by the various groups and committees, they could be up for review from all three NCAA Management Councils in April. Those initiatives that are moved successfully upward through the governance chain could be implemented as early as the 2000-01 academic year.

"We'll be looking to fast-track some of these things," Whitcomb said, "not as proof that the summit had an impact, but because it's the right thing to do. We can't leave here and say it was a great day and then two months later not see or hear anything.

"This is an issue that's been neglected far too long for that."

Summit panelists

Jennifer Alley, executive director, National Association of Collegiate Women Athletic Administrators

Dorothy J. Alston, senior woman administrator, North Carolina A&T State University

Beth Bass, executive director, Women's Basketball Coaches Association

Linda Bruno, commissioner, Atlantic 10 Conference

Lori Ebihara, director of compliance, Big 12 Conference

Earl Edwards, director of athletics, East Stroudsburg University of Pennsylvania

Benita Fitzgerald Mosely, director of training centers, United States Olympic Committee

Marianna Freeman, president, Black Coaches Association

Tina Sloan Green, executive director, Black Women in Sports Foundation

Betty Jaynes, chief executive officer, Women's Basketball Coaches Association

Cheryl L. Levick, chair, NCAA Committee on Women's Athletics

Donna Lopiano, executive director, Women's Sports Foundation

Jan Rintala, president-elect, National Association of Girls and Women in Sport

Tanya V. Rush, senior woman administrator, Morgan State University

Gloria R. Scott, president, Bennett College

Timothy Stoner, executive director, Black Coaches Association

Ronald J. Stratten, vice-president for education services, NCAA

Christopher Walker, faculty athletics representative, University of Redlands

Charles Whitcomb, chair, NCAA Minority Opportunities and Interests Committee