Some Progress Is Being Made in Racial Diversity in College Sports Administration

The latest report on the status of Blacks in college sports has been released by The Institute for Diversity and Ethics in Sport (TIDES) at the University of Central Florida.

The scorecard gave a grade of B for racial diversity in college sports programs. This was up from a C+ two years ago.

Richard Lapchick, director of TIDES and the lead author of the report, stated that “College Sport has historically not been good at increasing opportunities for women and people of color. Outside of HBCU institutions, the representation of women and people of color in leadership positions within collegiate athletics has been weak.”

• In Division I, African Americans make up more than 53.2 percent of the male student athletes in basketball and more than 45.1 percent in football, but Blacks are only 4.1 percent of the baseball student athletes.
• Blacks are 45 percent of the football players in Division I but only 7.3 percent of the head football coaches. This was down from 7.7 percent two years ago.
• African Americans are 9.1 percent of all head coaches for men’s teams and 8.3 percent of head coaches for women’s teams in Division I. The percentage of Black head coaches is lower in Divisions II and III.
• Blacks are 23.6 percent of the head coaches for men’s basketball in Division I. In the 2005-06 season, African Americans were 25.2 percent of all head coaches for men’s basketball in Division I.
• African Americans are only 1.1 percent of all head coaches in Division I baseball.
• Until this year, all conference commissioners for schools in the Football Bowl Subdivision have been White. Keith Gill and Kevin Warren made history this past year  when they were chosen to lead the Sun Belt and Big Ten conferences, respectively
• Blacks are 8.8 percent of athletic directors at Division I institutions, down from 9.1 percent two years ago. African Americans have lower representation among athletic directors at Division II and Division III colleges and universities.