Striking Out

Black Enterprise, Jan, 1999 by Bevolyn Williams-Harold

Black coaches find closed doors in the college ranks

African American players may dominate college football fields and basketball courts, but behind the scenes it's a different story. According to a study by Northeastern University's Center for the Study of Sport in Society, minorities are vastly underrepresented in college coaching and upper management ranks.

During the 1995-96 season, only 4.2% of the 7,101 head coaching positions in men's sports were held by African Americans. Worse yet, black women coached only 1.5% of the 6,881 college women's teams. In contrast, at the NCAA Division I level, 63% of basketball players, 52% of football players and 6.9% of baseball players were black males.

Of the three major college sports, basketball has the highest percentage of black head coaches, 11.3%, vs. 2.7% for football and 0.8% for baseball. Moving further into the managerial ranks, only 8.6% of athletic directors, the top management spot on the college level, were people of color. As the report concludes, the diversity in the playing fields needs to be extended to decision-making positions.

                   Percentage of Black Administrators
                      at NCAA Member Institutions

                                  1995-96      1997-98     Change

Director of athletics                 7.5%         6.9%      0.6%
Associate director of athletics       8.2          6.8      -1.4
Assistant director of athletics       8.5          8.9       0.4
Senior woman administrator            9.1          9.1       --
Academic advisor                     20.0         24.8       3.9
Overall(*)                            8.4          8.5       0.1

NOTE: Figures do not include historically black colleges and universities

(*) All athletics administrators, including graduate assistants and interns.

                     Percentage of Black Head Coaches
                       at NCAA Member Institutions

                                  1995-96      1997-98    Change

Men's teams                           7.6%         7.8%     0.2%
Women's teams                         7.5          7.3     -0.2
Men's revenue sports(*)              12.7         13.0      0.3
Women's revenue sports(**)           12.2         10.6     -1.6

NOTE: Figures do not include historically black colleges and universities

(*) Football and basketball.

(**) Basketball.