Running the Show: Female Athletic Directors Navigate Challenging Terrain

The pandemic has upended athletic departments in every division. There are COVID-19 protocols, ever-changing schedules, and losses in revenue that impact student-athletes, coaches, and staff. Overseeing it all are athletic directors who must figure out how to get everything done with less revenue, more expenses, and an ever-changing college sports landscape.

We found five female ADs at institutions playing at the Divisions I, II, III and community college levels of National Collegiate Athletics Association (NCAA) competition, as well as one whose institution competes in the National Association of Intercollegiate Athletics (NAIA), who address some of the most pressing current issues in intercollegiate athletics. They also work toward advancing gender equity as the 50th Anniversary of Title IX approaches.

“As we continue to come out of [the COVID-19 pandemic] and recognize the challenges that our staff and our student-athletes have had — in their own development and experiences — it’s been significantly different the last two-plus years than any of us ever anticipated,” says Chrissi Rawak, director of intercollegiate athletics and recreation services at the University of Delaware, a Division I institution that competes in FCS football. “We’re still trying to reconcile and understand what the implications are — mental health challenges, learning challenges, and the opportunity to compete.”

Pressing Issues

Heather MacCullochHeather MacCulloch, director of athletics and recreation at Baruch College (part of the City University of New York) says lost revenues have been problematic and creativity has been essential. Baruch’s athletic department relies heavily on rental income from its facility, which provided the payroll money for several employees in the department. That income stopped when the facility shut down in March 2020. Although sports resumed at the Division III institution for the 2021-22 academic year, rentals are still not allowed.

“Another issue for us is lack of outdoor facilities,” says MacCulloch, detailing an issue many urban institutions face. “A lot of time, money and energy are spent on making inquiries to every and any place that we can either get a permit for or rent. This is not only for games but practices too.”

Pressing issues for Mary Hegarty, athletics director at Santa Ana College, a two-year institution in California, are centered around California-specific rules she hopes to influence to change. In California community colleges, full-time coaches have typically been full-time tenured faculty members (usually teaching kinesiology) with tenure largely based on academic assessments and professional responsibilities, not athletic outcomes. When she took this job four years ago, most of the coaches were already in place and she could not make changes.