In late 2020, the topic of diversity in collegiate sports—more specifically the lack of it in positions of leadership—popped up again, partially as a result of recent racial tensions in the U.S. In its latest report card, The Institute for Diversity and Ethics in Sport (TIDES) assigned Football Bowl Subdivision schools a B- for racial hiring practices and an F for their gender hiring practices, giving an overall grade of D+. However, improvement may lie ahead in 2021.

It’s no secret that the NCAA has looked the other way when it comes to creating opportunities for people of color and women for far too long. The university hiring process for coaches and executives in college sports is led by chancellors, with athletic directors having the final say in who is hired for a position. Whether intentional or not, this has led to bias during the hiring process, and there is a general lack of intervention against the underrepresentation in coaching.

“There will continue to be an issue as long as the athletic directors, presidents or chancellors within these university systems who hire these coaches do not feel the need to bring a different perspective to their hiring practices,” said Richard Lapchick, a human rights advocate and professor at the University of Central Florida. “The NCAA needs to mandate diverse candidate pools for the interview process with at least two diverse candidates being interviewed.”

To be fair, the NCAA has tried to better their hiring practices in the past. In 2016 the Presidential Pledge was introduced. Institutions who sign the pledge resolve to express support for diversity and “inclusion efforts within intercollegiate athletics,” according to the NCAA website. Though 878 of the 1,111 universities in the three NCAA divisions have signed the pledge, the statistics still show a disappointing lack of diversity. The Presidential Pledge is not at all binding and doesn’t have specific regulation; as a result, it does not have the desired impact.

“I don’t think we see a lack of women because there are not qualified women,” said Sherryta D. Freeman, Director of Athletics at Lafayette College (an institution of Division I FCS). “It’s more so in the eyes of hiring managers, a lack of confidence… that women can oversee football or that women can be able to oversee the head football coach.”

“It’s just a matter of being hired by someone who believes in you… Leadership is not based on gender,” said Freeman. 

In an effort to create accountability in gender hiring practices, Lapchick worked together with the West Coast Conference on something called the Russell Rule, which requires teams to interview ethnic minority candidates for leadership positions. The NCAA Board of Directors met in January to consider the Russell Rule as a policy to implement in college sports. The board encouraged the rule’s implementation by NCAA schools, concluding that it would have a positive effect on diverse leadership, and urged schools to evaluate their own progress regarding fair hiring practices. Though the NCAA Board’s statements on this matter were left vague and open to speculation, hopefully, this hard work will bear fruit in the form of better representation among leadership positions in collegiate athletics. 

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