University of Minnesota Report Offers Data on Head Coaches of Women’s College Teams

A new study by the Tucker Center for Women for Research on Women & Girls in Sport at the University of Minnesota finds little progress has been made in increasing the number of women who coach women’s teams at NCAA Division I colleges and universities. The report shows that in the 2016-17 academic year, women were 41.2 percent of all head coaches of women’s teams at these institutions. This is up from 41.1 percent a year ago.

The data shows that the gender gap in coaching positions is vastly different depending on the particular sport. For example, women were 80 percent or more of the head coaches for women’s teams in field hockey, lacrosse, and golf. At the other extreme, there were no women as head coaches for women’s teams in alpine skiing and water polo. Women were less than 20 percent of the head coaches of women’s teams in swimming, diving, cross country, and track & field.

The report noted that only two of the universities surveyed – the University of Cincinnati and the University of Central Florida –  had women as head coaches for 80 percent or more of their women’s teams. There were three universities where there was only one woman as a head coach of women’s teams: Syracuse University, West Virginia University, and Oklahoma State University.

The full study, Head Coaches of Women’s Collegiate Teams, may be downloaded by clicking here.