Female coaches get boost from Olympic Solidarity and international federations

While gender equality has made great strides among athletes at the Olympic Games, female coaches and officials are still woefully underrepresented.

According to the International Olympic Committee (IOC), only 10 per cent of accredited coaches at the Olympic Summer and Winter Games over the past 10 years have been women. In Tokyo, that figure rose to 13 percent, which pales in comparison to the 48 percent female participation at last summer’s Games.

The IOC, National Olympic Committees (NOC) and international federations aim to correct this imbalance among coaches.

The Women in Sport High Performance Pathway, also known as the WISH program, has been developed in coordination with a team of specialists based at the University of Hertfordshire in the United Kingdom.

Olympic Solidarity is providing $1 million to fund the program, which aspires to support female coaches “who have already demonstrated potential and ambition to succeed in gaining key roles at the highest level of their sport,” according to the IOC.

The program supports the implementation of the IOC’s Gender Equality and Inclusion Objectives for 2021-2024. The IOC also remains committed to accelerating female representation in sports leadership roles.

WISH will run four groups during the current quadrennium and expects to benefit approximately 100 coaches. The 21-month program will give the participants access to leadership training, sport-specific training and mentoring led by their IFs. They will also have engagement with the NOCs.

Online training began May 23 for 22 coaches from 20 NOCs and seven sports (bobsled/skeleton, cycling, judo, rugby, ski, volleyball and wrestling). These coaches will then go to the UK in August for a week of residential learning.

Coaches interested in participating in future programs are encouraged to apply through their international federations. They also must be supported by their NOC in order to be accepted.

The WISH program is a successor to the Women’s Sport Leadership Academy (WSLA HPC), an IOC program which ran from 2019 to 2021. The academy helped develop 26 women from 23 NOCs and six sports (cycling, rowing, rugby, tennis, triathlon and wrestling).

According to the IOC, three of the participants attended the Olympic Games Tokyo 2020 in coaching, team or technical official roles, while 15 are now in national coaching positions. Two are coaching men’s professional teams. In addition, eight of the participants are delivering education and mentoring to support the development of other female coaches.

Pamela Fulton, a triathlon coach from Zimbabwe, calls WSLA a “real life-changer.” She is now mentoring athletes as well as coaches and other women in sport.

”It was an incredible experience that really helped me grow in confidence, and it also helped with thinking about what my goals are,” Fulton said, according to the IOC. “It made me really sit down and think, ‘What do I really want?’ And then work out the pathway to get there.”

Fulton said her dream is to coach an athlete at the Olympic Games. “I’ve been to the Youth Olympic Games, and was very lucky to do that, but obviously everyone wants to go to the Olympics,” she said. “It’s difficult because most athletes don’t stay in Zimbabwe once they get to university or college, so I’ve always thought, ‘It’s not possible.’ But what WSLA taught me is not to give up.”

Fulton said she and the other participants inspired and supported each other.

”We were all in the same position; all we were wanting to do is try and do the best we can for our own federations and for our athletes,” she said. “To find out what some of the other ladies have been up to, it makes you think, ‘Okay, I need to get more motivated and get out there. If they can do that, I can do that.’ It makes you think a bit more out of the box as to what else you can do and what you can achieve.”

Fulton hopes she can inspire other women. “The sky’s the limit,” she said, “and I don’t want anyone else thinking, ‘I can’t do that because I’m a woman.’ If you want it, go for it.”