Small College Athletics Change

Hey everyone,
Just wanted to get some input on what to do in this situation for a friend.

I graduated from a small school (10,000 enrollment) back in August of 2013 (still looking for a full-time job), and I was the Sports Editor of the weekly college paper there from 2012-2013.

I led the resurgence of the sports section which had not been focusing on the campus athletics when I came in. Now, my friend is the Sports Editor there, and I helped train him into the position.

The athletics department recently went through some changes. Before I graduated, they changed the school mascot in September. With that, came some changes in the athletic department.

The school let go of the AD, and put in charge, an interim AD who had previously played sports for another college. She's not very transparent in many of the changes that are happening. Along with the AD, she has fired nearly every other coach, or made them retire/resign. (Women's Basketball (twice)/Men's Basketball/Soccer/Cross Country/Softball/Assistant AD/Volleyball (this guy had been there since the inception of the team, 32 years).

They post on their website, but not about the changes of the staff in the department.

When he tries to get information from the Interim AD, responses are slow, and he could schedule a meeting with her but could take awhile because this person is so busy. The school is supposed to be hiring a new AD come this summer, from what I've heard.

He wants to know what is going on, because all of the mentioned above have been let go from when she took the position until now. He wants to go to the Interim AD, but like I said, is very hard to get information out of even when she does answer.

How transparent is an athletic department or even the school supposed to be when it's going through so many changes, trying to create athletics into a bigger thing on campus.

Thanks for the help everyone.

 

AD won't talk? Talk to the fired coaches. Get them to go on record

 

What's crazy is that they don't want to talk about it for some reason.

 

Let's start with the basics: Public or private university?

 

If, as you mentioned, there's an effort under way to raise the profile of the athletic department, then surely there are other officials involved, not just an interim AD. That broader effort -- to raise the athletic department's status, to make the teams more competitive, etc. ... whatever it is -- seems to be the real story. So the president of the college or some representative from the board of trustees should be interview targets in order to find out what's really going on.

Is the interim AD a candidate for the job on a permanent basis? If not, then I'd want to ask some of the top officials what they're looking for in an AD, what direction they want to go with athletics, etc.

Reporting the blow-by-blow of what's happening is necessary, and I agree it's frustrating if they're not being transparent about it. But don't limit things to dealing just with the interim AD, and don't miss the overall story.

 

I'm thinking public, based on the name of the school he gave before editing his original post

 

Don't schools also have the right to censor its school paper?

 

Indeed it is public.

 

I don't believe the Interim AD is a candidate as they have a permanent position with the university.

 

An enrollment of 10,000 does not seem like a small school

Carry one.

 

Honestly, if you're not getting any help from the athletic department, I say FOIA their emails. It will depend on what your state's sunshine laws are, but have an idea of what you're looking for and put in a FOIA request for all emails pertaining to that topic (you usually can't just do a blanket FOIA for all emails).

If you've never filled out an open records request before, the Student Press Law Center website has a good template that allows you to pick the state you're in. Be sure to enter in there that you'll pay a maximum of $0 for the records. If they hassle you about printing costs, tell them you can come over there with a USB drive.

 

Then you should be able to make some FOIA requests. Direct them to the interim AD. She'll know you're not to be fucked around with.