Kristina Dailing
Daily Egyptian
Former SIU Associate Athletic Director Charlotte West‚s biggest obstacle has been trying to change attitudes.
Although she‚s succeeded in changing so many during her 41-year career, she still spends much of her time helping to train women to deal with „dinosaurs‰ who don‚t think women want to or need to participate in sports.
So West considers her biggest thrill in life to be helping women gain equal access to sports and athletic administration positions.
„Being a part of creating opportunities for women has been a great achievement,‰ West said. „I very much believe in educational sports.‰
West now serves as the dean of faculty for the National Association of Collegiate Women Athletic Administrators. The organization, along with Higher Education Resource Services, hosts an institute every summer that helps teach women skills to become athletic administrators. The organization brings in speakers and puts on workshops that allow role playing as a part of conflict resolution.
„It‚s rewarding to me because you are leaving a legacy and these women are going to go out with know-how when all we had was trial and error,‰ West said.
And West is the reason many of these women even have the opportunity to go to college in hope of being directors on college campuses.
„We wouldn‚t be near where we are now if she hadn‚t been here working for women in athletics,‰ said SIU Athletic Director Paul Kowalczyk.
Her former student and athlete, SIU women‚s tennis head coach Judy Auld, knows that she is in the position she is in because of West and her work in athletics.
„She‚s a very significant person and she opened doors for women in the coaching field as well as administration,‰ Auld said. „To know her took my life to another level.‰
West started it all during a time when women were not allowed on the playing field or on the courts.
She grew up in St. Petersburg, Fla., where she played sports in junior high and high schools, something she knows was a rare opportunity because schools didn‚t provide sports teams for women when she was growing up.
But her days of playing softball, volleyball, basketball and swimming came to an end when she attended Florida State University. She was shocked to find that colleges didn‚t have sports teams for women. It was a turning point in her life.
„Things influence you and when I look back, I think that was a big influence on me,‰ West said. „I thought there ought to be opportunities for women.‰
After she graduated with a degree in mathematics and physical education, she went back to St. Petersburg, where she taught and coached in high school for two years. After she received her master‚s in 1957, she began looking for a teaching job.
At the time, SIU was one of the few schools around the nation that provided women‚s sports teams. West was hired as a teacher and began coaching.
When she first arrived, there were only women‚s teams for field hockey, basketball, softball and tennis. In her first year, she established the volleyball team and eventually helped start the women‚s golf team.
In 1975, she retired from teaching and coaching to become the informal director of Athletics for women and then the director of Athletics for women when then SIU Interim President Hiram Lesar formally established the Women‚s Athletic Department.
In 1986, University President Albert Somit merged the Women and Men‚s Athletic Department into one, and West became the associate Athletic director and then interim Athletic director for a year. When Jim Hart took the position as Athletic director, West went back to the associate Athletic director position until July 1998.
During her term at SIU, West was discouraged that many universities still didn‚t allow women to participate in sports. West, along with some other women, went to the NCAA looking to it to start an organization that provided sports opportunities for women. When they were turned down, they formed the Association of Intercollegiate Athletics for Women. West served as commissioner of championships, coordinating all the championships and then as president.
„The explosion of growth of women‚s sports in the Œ70s was the most exciting time in the world,‰ West said.
The organization included women athletes from many of the four-year schools that the NCAA carried as well as smaller schools and junior colleges as well. With more schools participating than in the NCAA, the AIAFW grew larger than the NCAA and had 41 national championships in 19 different sports.
The organization closed its doors in 1982 after being taken over by the NCAA, which continued the tradition of women in sports.
During her career in athletics, West has served on countless committees and has received numerous awards for her work in athletics.
West served as chair of the NCAA Committee on Financial Aid and Amateurism, the NCAA Committee on Athletic Certification, the NCAA Council and was an influential part of the NCAA Gender Equity Task Force. She was also elected by members of the Missouri Valley Conference to be its representative on the NCAA Management Council.
West was also the first woman to be a member of the National Association of Collegiate Directors of Athletics and the first woman to receive the Honda Award given for outstanding achievement in women‚s collegiate athletics.
She was the first member to be recognized by the National Association of Collegiate Women Athletic Administrators as the Woman Administrator of the Year, and she was inducted into the initial class of women in the SIU Hall of Fame.
After her retirement, West was recognized by the All-American Football Foundation with the Senior Sports Administrator Award given for outstanding performance in the profession. Her alma mater, Florida State, recently honored her as one of four „grads made good‰ at the annual Homecoming celebration.
West said she has enjoyed her journey, bumps and all, and she laughs when people ask about when she decided to be an athletic director.
„I never decided that because there weren‚t any,‰ West said. „There were no women in athletic administration when I was younger.‰
But now, 46 years after she started teaching and coaching in Southern Illinois, West sees that there are more than a hundred thousand women athletes at universities around the nation, and there are a handful of women athletic directors leading athletes at universities as well.
„Her scope of influence has resonated well beyond the borders of Southern Illinois,‰ Kowalczyk said.
Reporter Kristina Dailing can be reached at kdailing@dailyegyptian.com.
Published on 11/17/05; 12:24:44 PM
