Happy National Girls and Women in Sports Day!

National Girls and Women in Sports day is today; a time when female athletes are honored. Check out this totally awesome slideshow compiled by the WomenTalkSports.com contributors! To see events and conversations going on throughout the country today, visit this page on WomenTalkSports.com.

Reading: Millenial Makeover

This blog post is part of my ongoing weekly series discussing the role of social media and female athletics. It’s also a class requirement for a course I’m taking at John’s Hopkins University.

This week’s reading is called Millenial Makeover: MySpace, YouTube, and the Future of American Politics by Morley Winograd & Michael Hais.

This book is a story about me.

Why? Because I was born in 1985. I’m part of Generation Y -  I was born within the timeframe of 1982-2003.

Winograd & Hais refer to me as part of the “civic” generation -   my peers and I actually outnumber my “boomer” parents (by 10 million). We helped nominate and elect President Barack Obama, and, according to these authors, we will transform and dominate politics for the next 40 years.

Why?

Because we’re more engaged than any other population. “The attacks of 9/11 and the growing threat of terrorism and Islamic extremism” - are making us “pay attention” to things more.  Pop Culture is capturing the “comedy” of our attention, and the technology wave is at our fingertips…. and we’re using it… every day, to create change.

Read more

The power of the telephone: feminism, sports and social change

This blog post is part of my ongoing weekly series discussing the role of social media and female athletics.

I’ve been blogging the past couple of weeks about social media and its impact upon women in sport – mainly due to my own personal interests but also to fulfill a class requirement. This week, I’m compelled to change it up a little big and bring us back to a time before the Internet and social media, a time when we relied upon the telephone. Why? Because I am beginning to realize it’s just still as “social” as any other media utilized today.

I’m going to take you back to a time that I can only imagine (because I wasn’t alive). Let’s think about the 19760′s and 1970′s, a time when our foresisters (female equivalent of forefathers) organized and fought for an equal playing field as it relates to gender and sport.

Let’s think of people like Bernice Sandler, a part-time lecturer at the University of Maryland, and Rep. Martha Griffiths (D-Michigan), Rep. Edith Green (D-Ohio), researchers like Vivian Acosta and Linda Jean Carpenter, and athletes like Billie Jean King who started coming together at the grassroots level to create change. For the sake of this post, let’s call these women “feminists.” (but I don’t want to label anyone)

According to the Women’s Sports Foundation, during that time, there existed a combination of, “the modern feminist movement, a youth culture, and other sources of social unrest.” And these are women who did something about it.

Read more

Live Blogging from the Women’s Sports Foundations’s Annual Salute to Women in Sports!

Tonight, I’m going to be live blogging from the Women’s Sports Foundation’s Annual Salute to Women in Sports event at the Waldorf-Astoria in New York. Stay tuned below around 6pm ET for some live coverage from the Red Carpet!

Tonight’s evening hosts include Bob Costas, Mary Carillo, and Billie Jean King, Women’s Sports Foundation’s founder. Honorees include Annika Sorenstam, legendary golfer and philanthropist, Dick Ebersol, Chairman of NBC Universal Sports & Olympics, and Pat Summitt, University of Tennessee head women’s basketball coach  and all-time winningest coach in NCAA history.

Follow me live over at WomenTalkSports.com. Or, follow me on Twitter: @mhueter

NCAA career development program for women

The NCAA is holding a career development program that’s targeting women, announced today. It’s going to be held on December 17 in conjunction with the women’s volleyball championship at the St. Pete Times Forum in Tampa, Florida.

Here’s the kicker: Registration is limited to 35 participants and is currently open to female students and student-athletes from any division and sport.

Ok, so you’re targeting women. But only 35 of us? How exactly is that intended to make a realistic impact in getting women involved in college sports careers?

If you’d like to voice your opinion (or get more information), contact Karen Morrison, NCAA director of gender initiatives, at kmorrison@ncaa.org.

Facebook, Myspace, Twitter and sports advocacy (Part 2)

 

This blog post is part 2 of a series dicussing my experiences with Facebook, Myspace and Twitter as they relate to  advocacy issues that highly affect the women’s sport sphere. This is an assignment for a class I’m enrolled in as part of John’s Hopkins University’s Digital Communications program.

Facebook:
I’ve decided to “ramp-up” my networking power by joining an event for a local group called Women In Sports and Events (WISE). It’s a “how-to-network presentation and panel discussion with some of the top executives within the D.C. Sports & Events industry,”  taking place this Tuesday at 6pm.

How did I RSVP? Through Facebook, of course. So far there are six attendees (WISE is a local thing – there are groups in every major city). I’ll be sure to look at this panel with an advocacy perspective and check back with any learnings that I find.

Read more

Facebook, Myspace, Twitter and Title IX (Part 1)

So another assignment for the class that I’m taking is to post at least once/week about my experiences with groups, conversations, and other opportunities on MySpace, Facebook and Twitter (related to politics and issue advocacy). (yes, I’m going to have to dust off my MySpace account)

Keep in the sports twist, I’m going to try and relate my experiences to Title IX (political advocacy issue), but apoligize as I’m somewhat skeptical that I’ll come up a bit light on my search and experiences in the Web 2.0 world. I’ll be doing this on a case-by-case basis each week, reflecting upon my immediate conversations about Title IX on social networks.

1) Facebook
First place I looked for info about Title IX on Facebook was the Women’s Sports Foundation Fan Page (has 725 fans – not bad, but not good either). First thing I noticed: I thought their call to vote on Sportswoman of the year is a great way to engage their fans. However, when I clicked the link to vote, it didn’t work. Yikes. BUT they allow my comment to appear below it. So I have a voice. That’s good.

Read more

(Video) Christiane Amanpour on the importance of women in sport

Below is a video – created and distributed by the Women’s Sports Foundation (WSF) – of Christiane Amanpour, CNN Chief International Correspondent, on the importance of sport in the lives of women and girls.

It is vitally important that those in the public eye who support women’s sports continue to participate in opportunities such as these, regardless of how much/little they’re paid for doing so.

Props to WSF for making this video available and embeddable. I found this on WSF’s Facebook Fan Page. They’ve got some great content up there – highly recommend you promote it within your network. They also have a Cause Page – great way to recruit friends as engaged advocates. Enjoy!

Fair pay and athletics: The gender disparities continue to loom

This post is part of an initiative by the National Women’s Law Center in honor of Equal Pay Day — “voices are rising up across the web in support of fair pay for women.” All day, they’ll be promoting blog posts about fair pay and tweets with the hashtag #fairpay.

The reason today is Equal Pay Day: April 28, 2009 marks the day when the average woman’s wages will finally catch up with those paid to the average man in 2008 (note – that was last year). Here’s where you can find state-by-state data on the wage gap.

So what can you to help? Well, if you’re a blogger, register here and blog about it. If you’re not (or you don’t want to), then urge your Senators to support the Paycheck Fairness Act.

In keeping with my theme, I wanted to share some interesting information about fair pay in athletics. Some may think that these days, women get paid “very similar” or even “close to” men. But that’s hardly the case, as you can see… Read more

Male Coaches

I know what you’re thinking, what an odd title for a women’s sports blog!  What does it mean to have two male coaches in the women’s final? was featured this afternoon on the NCAA Double-A Zone blog.  The article opens restating the statistics released earlier this year by the NCAA in the Perceived Barriers Study, that we covered in Gender Barriers in Athletics.

Until reading this article I had not realized that this is just the second time in history that two male head coaches meet on the stage of the women’s final.  (the first time coming in 1988.)    

Now, I’m hoping that Marta Lawrence wrote this article just to get a rise out of people like me.  And if so, congratulations!  The questions asked really got me thinking, and caused me to react!  I want to make sure I am not misunderstood, I have had multiple good male coaches, and I know MANY good male coaches of female athletes.  I have nothing against men who coach women.  How many people are going to assume that Louisville and UConn met tonight in the National Champioinship game because they have male coaches?  How many people are going to belive that the Geno Auriemma and Jeff Walz  are more qualifed, more successful, more talented, than Pat Summit, C. Vivian Stringer, Tara VanDerveer, Sherri Coale, simply because they are men. 

So, does the game tonight work to reiterate the subconscious notion that men are better suited to coaching than women?

In one word: No.  

Do women still need to climb the gender equity hill or is tonight’s game an indication that we’ve moved to a post-gender time in women’s athletics?

1) It doesn’t bother me that the coach of the UConn Huskies and the Louisville Cardinals are men.  It doesn’t bother me that the top two women’s basketball teams in the country are coached by men.  We know the facts.  Only 42% of women’s college teams are coached by women.  In 1972, the birth of Title IX, 90% of women’s college teams were coached by women.  It upsets me that people will look at tonight and say “men are better suited to coaching than women.” 
2) Women definitely still need to climb the gender equity hill.  The worst thing that we can do as women, as leaders, and as mentors to young children, is to think that “we’ve moved to a post-gender time in women’s athletics.”  If we believe that, if we allow that thought to creep into our minds, we will lose everything our founding mothers fought for when Title IX was enacted. 

“There’s always going to be another mountain
I’m always going to want to make it move
Always going to be an uphill battle,
Sometimes I’m gonna to have to lose,
Ain’t about how fast I get there,
Ain’t about what’s waiting on the other side
It’s the climb”

(I SWEAR I chose this quote before that little tribute to the women’s tournament…even if it’s sad to admit!)

WHOW

WHOW … Women Helping Other Women.

These were the opening words spoken by Judy Sweet at the NCAA Women’s Leadership Symposium in Boston, MA on March 20th and 21st.  (I apologize for the delay in this blog!)

Let me just start by saying there is no way that I can sum up the information shared over the course of these two days in the space of this blog, nor do I want to!  If you are a female athlete interested in collegiate athletics, then you MUST get yourself to one of these events and experience it for yourself.  Cheesey or not, this symposium changed my life!

Since, I’m not going to go into detail about the events of the symposium, I’m going to try to put into words what it did for me.  Two and a half months ago I posted a blog titled, Gender Barriers in Athletics.  At the time of this post I was feeling extremely discouraged in my career path.  I was wondering if I would ever break through the glass ceiling to find that dream job in college athletics.

After this symposium, I know that I will continue to do what I do, no matter how long it takes me to find that dream job!  The most valuable session in the symposium, for me, was Value Your Values.  I learned what it is that I love most about working in college athletics, and why I could never leave the field.

This symposium completely motivated me; I felt empowered to change the world when I left Boston, MA on Sunday, March 22nd.  I spent two days with 165 female – Athletic Directors, Coaches, Student-Athletes, etc. all working towards the same goal, all needing that same bit of inspiration, and all leaving feeling connected to each other.

NCAA, NACWAA, WLS, speakers/presenters, attendees:  THANK YOU!!

“Never doubt that a small group of thoughtful, committed citizens can change the world; indeed, it’s the only thing that ever has.”
- Margaret Mead

Webinar: Breaking Down Barriers: NWLC’s Guide to Title IX for Lawyers and Advocates

The National Women’s Law Center is hosting a webinar titled Breading Down Barriers, tomorrow (Thursday) at 1pm EST.

In partnership with the law firm DLA Piper, NWLC will focus upon empowering participants on how to be a resource as a Title IX advocate in your community.

To sign up, click here.

Specifically, the webinar will address:

• How schools can comply with Title IX
• Tips for recognizing Title IX violations
• Step-by-step guidance for addressing Title IX violations in the courts

Thanks again to the folks at NWLC for passing this along to me. If I can tear myself away from my desk, I’ll try to hop on.

Otherwise, I’m told there will be a recording of the session available on the NWLC Web site.

NWLC is one of many organizations committed to promoting women’s participation in sport. This webinar is part of the National Women’s Law Center’s Citi Education Series on Family Economic Security.

Also, for a great post on National Girls and Women in Sports day, check out Womenstake, the NWLC blog (I highly recommend adding it to your feed reader).

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