Life receives grant from the Women’s Sports Foundation

Life University received a grant from the Tara VanDerveer Fund for the Advancement of Women in Coaching and the Women’s Sports Foundation.

Life was one of 10 universities to receive the grant, which will be designated for a female coaching fellow in such women’s sports and activities. Grants were awarded to institutions to support collegiate female coaches on the rise, assisting with living expenses and professional development.

Life’s new coach with the women’s wrestling program will be Victoria Francis, a current senior world team member and prospective member of the 2020 U.S. Olympic team.

While a student at Lindenwood University in Missouri, Francis was a four-time All-American and two-time national champion. She was a 2017 senior world team member and also earned a junior world bronze medal in 2014 and was runner-up at the 2016 Olympic trials.

“We are proud to be a member of the inaugural class of the Women’s Sports Foundation Tara VanDerveer Fund recipients,” Life athletic director Jayme Pendergast said in a release. “We recognize the critical importance of closing the gender gap in the coaching ranks. Coaches support players on and off the field and play a pivotal role in their lives. Seeing more women in these influential roles, helps inspire our female student-athletes. This grant will allow us to make a significant addition to our already accomplished coaching staff, which in turn provides our wrestling student-athletes with additional support and resources to maximize their performance and their personal development.”

The Women’s Sports Foundation created the Tara VanDerveer Fund — named after the longtime Stanford women’s basketball coach and Basketball Hall of Fame inductee — to address the decline of women in coaching.

In the 1970-71 academic year, 90% of all head coaches for women’s college teams were women. In 2017, 45 years after the passage of Title IX, the NCAA reported that the number had dropped to 40%. Women of color make up just 5.6% of head coaches of women’s sports, and only 3.5% of all head coaches.

The Women’s Sports Foundation designed the fund to provide schools the opportunity to create fellowships for aspiring female collegiate coaches. The fellowships emphasize hands-on training and mentoring with established collegiate coaches as well as professional development and networking in order to identify paths to advancement.