Jan. 5, 2005
Columbia University is renowned for its multi-cultural campus community, so much so that it is one of the defining characteristics of the world-class institution. According to the list of the nation's most diverse institutions in U.S. News & World Report's "America's Best Colleges 2005," Columbia ranks among the top sixty schools in the country and second in the Ivy League behind only Harvard in campus diversity.
In keeping with this University-wide dedication to diversity, Columbia Athletics prides itself on being representative of the University's commitment through its highly diversified coaching and administrative staff.
In August, Columbia named Dr. M. Dianne Murphy Director of Athletics & Physical Education and Traci Waites head coach of women's basketball within one week of each other. This made the University the only non-Historically Black College/University (HBCU) NCAA Division I institution in the nation to have a female Director of Athletics and an ethnic minority coach of both men and women's basketball at present. Three other Division I schools - all HBCU institutions - meet that criteria: Howard, Morgan State and South Carolina State. Columbia is now one of 28 NCAA Division I schools to have both an African-American men and women's coach; 18 of those 28 are historically Black schools.
The hiring of Waites and men's Head Coach Joe Jones, which marked the first-ever simultaneous tandem of African-American head basketball coaches at an Ivy school, has already paid enormous dividends. Through January 5, the combined record of the basketball teams was 14-9. On January 3, Jones was named the mid-season Jim Phelan Mid-Major National Coach of the Year by CollegeInsider.com. Waites, who has the distinction of being the only women's player in NCAA history to play in basketball Final Fours for two Division I institutions, has already led her squad to two tournament titles this season. The Lions won the Iona Tipoff Tournament in November and the Hattiesburg Inn on the Hill Classic in December.
In all, the Lions' staff of head coaches now features five ethnic minorities. In addition to Jones and Waites, there is Derek Davis (archery), Bid Goswami (men's tennis) and Monica Holmes (volleyball). Columbia has a total of 24 head coaches for its 29 intercollegiate teams (there is one coach for men and women's indoor & outdoor track & field and men's cross country, co-head coaches for fencing and one head coach for men and women's golf), so 20.8 percent of the school's head coaches are ethnic minorities, compared to the national average of 15.3 percent. This is in addition to six other female head coaches out of a total of 15 women's team head coaches.
Like Jones and Waites, each of these coaches has experienced some measure of success. Goswami has coached five Ivy champion teams, and nine of his players have gone on to the professional tennis tour. Davis is in his first year coaching one of the nation's top archery programs and, after two seasons as head volleyball coach, Holmes has started to turn around the program in one of the region's most competitive conferences.
"We have to have one of the most diverse coaching staffs in the nation for a non-HBCU," says Holmes. "Diversity makes us stronger, and allows us to stand out. It makes a staff much more relatable to prospective student-athletes when recruiting across socio-economic and racial backgrounds."
"The vitality that each of these individuals brings to our athletics program is tremendous," notes Murphy. "The level of success they have experienced and their profound affect on our student-athletes are testament to the desirability of a diverse staff."
Columbia Athletics distinguishes itself from its peers in its commitment to women in top administrative positions as well. The NCAA recently reported that 7.9 percent of Division I schools had a female Director of Athletics at the conclusion of the 2003-04 academic year. When Columbia President Lee C. Bollinger named Murphy Director of Athletics August 24, it made her the first woman to hold that title at Columbia. Additionally, 60 percent of Columbia's Associate Athletics Directors are women and 20 percent are Black, compared to Division I national averages of 31.8 and 9.8 percent, respectively.
The University's assistant coaches and athletics staff are also a diverse group. Eleven Columbia assistant coaches are ethnic minorities. Among them are assistant track & field coach Derrick Adkins, the 1996 Olympic gold medal-winner in the 400-meter hurdles; assistant women's basketball coach Natasha Pointer, who played for the (now-defunct) Portland Fire of the Women's National Basketball Association (WNBA); assistant wrestling coach Yero Washington, who narrowly missed making the U.S. Olympic wrestling team and went to Greece with the team as part of the official U.S. travel party; assistant golf coach Steve Oh '99, who sank the winning putt for Columbia to secure the Lions' 1999 Ivy League Championship; assistant football coach Carlton Hall was signed by the National Football League's San Diego Chargers as a free agent; assistant women's soccer coach Werner T. Dasbach played professionally in the United Soccer Leagues and started the Harlem Soccer Foundation youth organization.
Additionally, fourteen members of the Columbia Athletics staff are ethnic minorities. They include athletic trainers, athletic communications representatives, support staff, both directors of basketball operations and the Director of the Dick Savitt Tennis Center.
