The adoption of Title IX in 1972 created opportunities for women athletes and coaches.
Currently, 8 of the 11 head coaches in the PAC 12 women’s’ tennis programs are female. The USC, Oregon, and Utah programs have male head coaches and Oregon State is the lone school without a tennis program.
Four of the 10 assistant coaches are female and 2 of the 6 volunteer coaches are female. Overall 14 of the 27 coaches for women’s’ teams are female.
It is a much different story with the men. There are 8 schools with programs (OSU, WSU, CU, and ASU do not have men’s programs.) All 23 coaches (head, assistant, and volunteer) are males. This is a bit surprising, given there are qualified women who are capable of coaching men.
Given there are differences in coaching men and women, it makes sense that a majority of the head coaches are female. The fact that a majority of the assistant and volunteer coaches are male is an indication that men have learned the subtleties of coaching women. It is also an indication that
there is a larger labor pool of male coaches and teaching professionals than women. Finally, many head coaches, including women head coaches, prefer to have men on their staffs because they can hit the ball harder in workouts with the women players.
Overall, the PAC 12 ratio of male to female coaches is 72% men/28% women. This is not significantly different from the male/female ratio of the teaching/coaching profession. The good news is that because of Title IX, more qualified women coaches are working in coaching positions and more men have become qualified to coach women.