Where Are the Women Fencing Coaches?
A snapshot into how USA Fencing clubs represent their coaching staff online
Overview
Take a look around any large tournament and you’ll find a lack of women coaching fencers. In 2019-2020 fencing season, WFencing released a report card. The report card looked at a lot of different roles within USA Fencing, NCAA, and USFCA, among other groups, to see how women were represented in senior, professional roles. However, the report card did not take a look at individual clubs and how they were staffed. I was curious to take a snapshot of how clubs present themselves and their coaches through their websites to see how prevalent women were at the club level.
Methodology
Between July 13-30 2023, I assessed USA Fencing clubs that had active memberships and were “Club Type” Private in the directory. From the directory, I went to all websites linked into USA Fencing for each club and checked their coaching staff pages to see how the club represented its coaching staff. I used bios or other clues to assign coaches listed online as Female/Male/Perceived Female/Perceived Male/Nonbinary. Data was pulled this late in July since membership would reset on August 1, 2023, and the number of clubs presented in the directory would drop at that time.
No Website
Some clubs had no website listed on USA Fencing. If they did not have a website, the website associated was broken, or just had a Facebook page, I always searched via Google to see if websites for the club existed. If they didn’t, I tagged the fencing club as having “no website”. These clubs were trimmed from the results.
No Coaches Listed
Similarly, some clubs had websites that did not list any coaching staff. These clubs were tagged as “no coaches listed” and trimmed from the results.
Out-of-Date Websites
Multiple times I found coaches listed on a club’s website when I knew that coach was no longer coaching there. However, I still included these coaches in the data because for some reason the club is still portraying them as a part of their community.
Only Coaches Counted
Many websites had staff listed and would include other roles such as founder, armorer, office manager, operations, etc. Only people presented as a “coach” were included in this data collection. Coach emeritus was also a role seen frequently; these were not included as they were not suggested as active coaches.
Gender Assignment
Only one fencing club, Wildcat Fencing, actually listed the preferred pronouns of their staff, which meant that as I went through websites I had to assign gender to the coaches. Most fencing club websites listing coaches included a bio that would include pronouns such as “she” or “he” in the description. If the bio included pronouns, I tagged coaches with she/her/hers in bio as “Female” and those with he/him/his in bio as “Male”. I also tagged coaches with “Female” or “Male” or “Nonbinary” based on if I personally knew how they identified.
If the bio did not contain pronouns for me to make an assessment, and I did not personally know them, I had to make an assumption based on other clues. Most listed coaches would have a name and picture. If someone had a feminine name and presentation, I tagged them as “Perceived Female”; similarly, if they had a masculine name and presentation, I tagged them as “Perceived Male”. If I could not make an assessment (no photo, unisex name, etc.) I tagged them as “Unknown”. “Unknown” coaches were trimmed from the results.
I understand gender is a more complicated conversation than this; however, I did the best I could with the information presented through the fencing club websites.
Results
At the time data was pulled, 568 clubs were present in the online USA Fencing directory. Once the list was trimmed to get rid of clubs without a website or those that did not have coaches listed on their website, there were 320 (56.34%) clubs remaining.
I believe these 320 clubs provide an accurate sampling of the overall fencing coach population in the US. According to USA Fencing on July 17, 2023, there are 411 coaches that identify as female and 1401 who identify as male. This means 22.68% of USA Fencing coaches are women. The data I was left with was similar: it included 253 female or perceived female coaches and 851 male or perceived male coaches for 22.92% of the sample coaches being women. Also, there was a similar percentage of men and women represented for both genders: 61.56% of female coaches were represented in my data pull, and 60.74% of the male coaches.
So let’s move on to the interesting results.
Who Is on Staff?
Of the 320 clubs that were included in our sample, 168 had at least one coach who was female or perceived female when 304 had at least one coach who was male or perceived male. This means that 52.5% of clubs have a female coach on staff, compared to 95% of clubs having a male coach on staff.
Only 5% (16 out of 320) of clubs only listed female or perceived female coaches as their staff.
Compare this to nearly half of all clubs, 47.5%, who had only listed male coaches on staff.
Since women are listed in 168 clubs and there are 253 female or perceived female coaches overall, the clubs with women on staff had a rate of 1.51 female or perceived female coaches listed. This suggests that many of the clubs with a woman on coaching staff only have one woman on staff.
For men, however, they are a part of 304 fencing clubs and there are 851 male or perceived male coaches overall. Here the rate was 2.80, suggesting that most clubs had at least two male coaches listed on their website. Overall the average number of coaches at a club was 3.46 coaches.
FencingTracker Top Clubs
On July 30, 2023, I pulled data on the top and largest clubs from FencingTracker.
Largest Clubs
Of the largest clubs, 80% of the top ten largest clubs have at least one female or perceived female coach on staff. Exceptions are Salle Auriol Seattle and LAIFC, who only have male or perceived male coaches listed. All clubs had male or perceived male coaches on staff.
Top Epee Clubs
Of the top epee clubs on FencingTracker, 88.89% have at least one female or perceived female coach on staff. This was taken out of 9 because NYAC does not list its coaches on the website. NYFA only has male or perceived male coaches listed. All clubs had male or perceived male coaches on staff.
Top Foil Clubs
Of the top foil clubs on FencingTracker, 75% have at least one female or perceived female coach on staff. This was taken out of 8 because neither Massialas Foundation nor V Fencing list coaches on their websites. LAIFC and Tim Morehouse Fencing Club only have male or perceived male coaches listed. All clubs had male or perceived male coaches on staff.
Top Saber Clubs
Of the top saber clubs on FencingTracker, 60% have at least one female or perceived female coach on staff. Bergen, Globus, Southern California Fencing Academy, and Tim Morehouse Fencing Club only have male or perceived male coaches listed. All clubs had male or perceived male coaches on staff.
Nonbinary Coaches
Only two coaches at two different clubs were identified as nonbinary. It is hard to make any determinations on nonbinary coaches at present as they represent such a small part of the sample population, and because I also made a lot of assumptions about gender for this post.
Anecdotal Observations
In husband/wife pairs involved in a fencing club, I observed that sometimes the woman was described as “so-and-so’s” wife. I did not see any examples of men being described as the husband.
Bios for female or perceived female coaches tended to be brief compared to the male or perceived male coaches on the same club website.
While I did not tag specific coach roles (such as head coach, coach, assistant coach, lead coach, etc.), very few fencing clubs had a woman designated as the head coach.
Recommendations
The Easy Recommendations
From what I’ve seen, I have a couple recommendations that are easy for any club to accomplish in an afternoon.
If you have coaches consistently working for your club, list them.
Many websites didn’t list coaches at all. Some websites were clearly missing staff. Listing your coaches as transparently as you can can help build trust with your customers, especially parents who may be curious who their child will be interacting with. It adds a human element to the website. Additionally, keep your coaching staff list up-to-date. While it does take administrative effort to keep your coaching list updated, it’s worth it. It’s a good business practice overall: you don’t want to have someone listed who no longer represents you and your club.
Use photos of your coaches on your staff page.
At the end of the day, fencing clubs are selling a service (coaching). This study suggests having high quality, trustworthy photos of staff on your website can make potential fencers more likely to buy your services. Many non-scientific articles from marketers also agree that customers are more likely to buy if they can see the face of the person selling. What makes a photo trustworthy? We suggest a high quality image where the coach is smiling.
Make sure bios are of equal length and detail for men and women.
Present your coaches equally based on what level they are. What I mean by this is if you have co-head coaches who are male and female, their bios should be around the same length and just as descriptive. A head coach versus a beginner assistant coach might have different length profiles based on experience, but everyone within a certain tier of coaching should have similar presentation regardless of gender.
Add pronouns to your webpage for staff members.
In today’s world, it is becoming more and more standardized within organizations to include your pronouns in bios, email signatures, or more. I was surprised that only one club in my review had pronouns listed, even though I had not thought to do that on my own club website. Adding pronouns shows inclusivity.
Don’t frame female coaches in terms of their husband.
Self-explanatory, but if both spouses are on staff, don’t frame the woman as “wife of male coach” unless the male coach is also framed as the woman’s husband.
The Systemic Change
Importantly, we have a distinct lack of women coaching fencing. It’s a crisis. If we are able to create systemic change that promotes more women into professional roles in fencing, we will all benefit, but particulary female athletes will as well. From a business perspective and At the club level, for example, having women in leadership roles such as coaching leads to a high level of trust in the organization.
This isn’t going to change through women alone working to create opportunities for women: the clubs that are male-run or male-dominated need to step up to start to create opportunities for female coaches.
Create Leadership Opportunities for New Female Coaches at the Club
This doesn’t have to be as complicated as it sounds! If you have female athletes who are engaged and enthusiastic, offer them leadership roles such as becoming an assistant coach for youth classes or camps. Give them opportunities to share their knowledge and guide others. Provide support, encouragement, and constructive feedback as they take on new roles. Some may enjoy it for a little while, others may become fully invested in coaching and want to take it further.
Provide Mentorship to Female Coaches
Within fencing, there are multiple ways you can provide mentorship. It can be based on technical skills, theoretical knowledge, or people skills. In any career, mentorship is vital to feeling belonging and to deepen understanding and skills. By mentoring women who coach, you can pave the way for them to become ultimately successful.
A good mentor should be a cheerleader, confidant, and advisor all rolled into one: the mentor should deeply care about the female coach mentee’s success and do everything in their power to help the mentee meet their goals. A good mentor-mentee relationship should be built on both trust and respect. Mentoring is not an excuse to mold the coach into your image, or to tout your methods as the absolute “right way”. It should be a relationship where you can guide a mentee to feel confident to make their own beneficial decisions.
Provide Access to Further Education
One way to bridge the gap for female fencing coaches is to provide access to further coaching education. This could be more formal such as funding an opportunity to learn at a USFCA clinic, but it doesn't have to be. If you have a newer woman coach at your club, provide opportunities to exchange coaching ideas. This could be a set time each week for you to collaborate on lessons and classes.
Provide Networking Opportunities
As a female coach is likely to be the only woman on staff at her club, it’s incredibly important to provide networking opportunities. You can provide personal connections such as introducing her to peer and mentor coaches you know that are also women. You can encourage her to enroll in the Women Coach Mentorship Program through USA Fencing, as a mentor or a mentee. You can cover membership to a woman-oriented professional fencing organization, WFencing. You can also direct her to online Facebook groups such as Women’s Fencing Network or WFencing Coaches and Professionals.
Be an Ally
Women are in the minority within coaching roles in fencing and face adversity due to their minority status. Be an ally to female coaches. Houston Sword Sports co-owner and coach Liz Mayerich has a great article on what allyship is. Taro Yamashito from Riverside Fencing Club wrote an article that provides an excellent framework for how to be an everyday ally. Outside of the recommendations in these articles, you can provide training on allyship to your staff through third party sources.
Practice Diverse Hiring & Equal Pay
If you have a coaching position open at your club, consider actively looking for women to fill the role. If you hire a female fencing coach, make sure your pay practices match how you pay the male coaches at your club.
Final Thoughts
This is meant to provide a snapshot from the end of the 2022-2023 season. All information in this post was correct as of July 30, 2023. Of course, with the publication of this post, things may change and clubs that did not previously list all their coaches may decide to. They also may follow other recommendations made in the article, such as adding pronouns, updating their coaching list, and hiring more diverse coaches.
Author Edit: A previous version said Boston Fencing Club did not list staff on their website. Since posting, I found the staff page and corrected the statement.
About the Author
Annamaria Lu is a coach and club owner at Fence St. Louis in St. Louis, MO. Sometimes she does research devoted to fencing. If you have an idea for a fencing-related research project, please contact Annamaria at annamaria@stlfencers.com.