Analyst Assesses Diversity at Football Bowl Subdivision Schools and Conferences
The key leadership positions at Football Bowl Subdivision (FBS) schools and conferences remain overwhelmingly white and male showing mixed progress across positions, according to a new study released by The Institute for Diversity and Ethics in Sport (TIDES) at the University of Central Florida.
This year’s report showed a decline in the percentage of women in campus leadership positions with a slight increase in the representation of people of color, especially for Latinos and Asians. Overall, most of the leadership positions remained the same or had close to a one-percentage point increase for people of color. FBS head football coach was the one significant position, which showed an increase in the percentage of whites.
TIDES released Mild Progress Continues: Assessing Diversity among Campus and Conference Leaders for Football Bowl Subdivision (FBS) Schools in the 2012-13 Academic Year. This is a study that examines the race and gender of conference commissioners and campus leaders, including college and university presidents, athletics directors and faculty athletics representatives for all 120 FBS institutions. The study also includes head football coaches, offensive and defensive coordinators, assistant coaches and student-athletes for the football teams. Finally, the faculty as a whole is examined.
Richard Lapchick, director of TIDES and principal author of the report, said, “The fact is that 90 percent of our presidents are white, 87.5 percent of our athletics directors are white, and 100 percent of our conference commissioners are white. In those positions, 76, 84.2, and 100 percent are white men, respectively. Overall, whites hold 332 (90.7 percent) of the 366 campus leadership positions reported in this study, which is no change in quantity from last year although the percentage dropped due to an increase of reportable leadership positions. The stagnant nature of diversity in campus leadership does not reflect the America that we know.
“With an all-time high of 19 head football coaches of color in last year’s report, we expected to see continued progress in the diversity of FBS head coaches. However, this report showed a decrease of one head coach of color for 2012. On a positive note, the number of Latino and Asian head coaches increased by one each with the hiring of Rich Rodriguez at the University of Arizona and Norm Chow at the University of Hawaii.”
The 18 head coaches of color include four new hires for the 2012 season. This includes the addition of Garrick McGee, University of Alabama at Birmingham, Curtis Johnson, Tulane University, Rich Rodriguez, University of Arizona, and Norm Chow, University of Hawaii. This does not include the hiring of Kevin Sumlin at Texas A&M University as he was previously the head coach of the University of Houston.
Lapchick said work remains.
“College sports still lags behind professional sports with opportunities for women and people of color for the top jobs.” he said. “The percentages remained stagnant in most categories of FBS Leadership highlighting the general picture that white men run college sport.”
