NCAA study shows AD jobs lacking in diversity

A recently released study by the NCAA has cast a stark light on the lack of diversity in college athletic departments nationwide.

The report, entitled "2003-04 Race and Gender Demographics of Member Institutions' Athletic Personnel," is compiled every two years. The latest report shows only small increases in minority hiring since the first edition in the 1995-96 academic year, and decreases in some categories within the study.

In the eight years that data has been collected, the percentage of minority athletic directors across all three divisions has fallen from 7.5 percent to 7.2 percent. That number includes the nation's approximately 23 Historically Black Colleges and Universities, or HBCUs. When those schools are excluded, there has been a minimal 0.3 percent increase in the number of minority athletic directors -- from 2.7 percent to 3 percent.

In Division I, there has been a 0.8 percent decrease in the number of minority athletic directors, from 10.1 percent to 9.3 percent, with HBCUs included. Excluding those schools, there has been a 0.3 percent drop, from 3.7 percent to 3.4 percent.

The study found that the most minority representation was in academic advising. Across all divisions, the percentage of minorities in that category has risen from 20.9 to 22.5 since 1995-96, and from 18.2 percent to 19.9 percent excluding HBCUs. In Division I, there has been an increase from 22.8 percent to 24.1 percent among all schools, and from 20.5 percent to 22.3 percent excluding HBCUs.

Eugene Marshall, outgoing chair of the NCAA Minority Opportunities and Interests Committee, expressed his displeasure with the new data in an interview, but also said that he was not surprised.

"We've been working with this process for a while, and when I call up to every opening for athletic director, or basketball coach or football coach, we send out a list of qualified minority candidates" to athletic directors and coaches, he said. "Very little is done to hire" minorities.

Marshall, who is also the athletic director at Division III Ramapo College in Mahwah, N.J., noted that "in the last two months there were probably about six openings. We had candidates and no minorities were hired."

He spoke at length about two of the higher profile minority coaches in Division I, Mississippi State University football coach Sylvester Croom and University of Notre Dame football coach Tyrone Willingham.

"The president at Mississippi State [J. Charles Lee] made a conscious effort that he was going to hire a minority football coach," Marshall said. "A lot of colleges and universities did not make that commitment, and until they do, the numbers don't change."

Croom is the first black head football coach in the history of the Southeastern Conference. While the SEC is by far one of the most glamorous conferences in the country, it also has a long and troubled history of racism.

Marshall said that Mississippi State, which fell from grace in recent years under Jackie Sherrill, "is not a good football job, so he's got to work extra hard to be successful at Mississippi State. The job that he should have gotten was at Alabama, but he didn't get that job."

The Crimson Tide changed coaches last year, replacing Mike Price with Dave Shula.

In the case of Willingham, Marshall said that "Notre Dame wasn't a good job when Tyrone got it."

Marshall also noted that Willingham was the second choice for the Irish, after former Georgia Tech head coach George O'Leary.

"The history is there but it's a tough job," Marshall said. He conceded that because of Notre Dame's national prominence, "the scrutiny is not so much because he's African-American, but he's going to have less of a grace period."

Penn Athletic Director Steve Bilsky also read the report, and gave his reaction to it in an interview yesterday.

"My reaction was somewhat surprised that there hasn't been more progress," he said. "I'm not sure how to equate that from a quantitative standpoint, but I would have thought that over the period of time that they looked at it there would be more progress than there's been."

Bilsky said that on his staff, "we have women and minorities in almost all units of our department, and throughout the department in significant leadership positions, so I feel good about that."

As for the Quakers' coaching ranks, Bilsky mentioned women's track head coach Gwen Harris and men's tennis head coach Mark Riley. Penn also has many minority assistant coaches, including Gil Jackson with men's basketball and Steve Downs on the football coaching staff.

"It's always hard to equate from a standpoint of what's satisfactory," Bilsky said. "But I will say that when I started here 21 years ago, there were no head coaches that were black."

Both Marshall and Bilsky spoke about the sometimes dueling pressures of focusing on minorities versus hiring the best coach for a position regardless of race, gender or other factors.

"I don't have a problem with that if it's true," Marshall said. "But there are other mitigating factors. There are trustees, there are boosters, there are alumni -- those are the people who say if they want to hire the best possible candidate no matter who it is."

Bilsky argued that the two philosophies are not mutually exclusive.

"The first step is to find as diverse a pool as possible," he said. "The second step is to hire the best person, without any kind of discrimination in the process or the hiring. They are not exclusive of each other."

Bilsky also stated emphatically that his department follows the University's affirmative action policies in hiring new staff.

That policy states, in part, the following:

"The foundation for achieving, valuing and managing diversity at Penn is equal opportunity. We have a clear commitment to equal opportunity, non-discrimination and affirmative action. This policy re-affirms our commitment in this regard. This policy of equal opportunity, affirmative action and non-discrimination is fundamental to the effective functioning of the University as an institution of teaching, scholarship and public service."

It seems, then, that the numbers speak for themselves -- there is still a ways to go toward minorities achieving full representation in the administrative side of collegiate athletics.

Please note All comments are eligible for publication in The Daily Pennsylvanian.