Interview by: Abby Gilbertson, Jinjin Han, Lily Kopplin, Kara Vande Brink, Skyylar Brescia, & Zoe Hazel
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Front Row Kneeling L-R: Jack Christ, Lily Kopplin, Abby Gilbertson. Back Row Standing L-R: Jinjin Han, Elaine Coll, Skylar Brescia, Zoe Hazel, Kara Vande Brink |
Imagine being one of the first people to overcome the gender barrier in college athletics. Elaine Coll was the founder of the modern-day women’s intercollegiate athletic program at Ripon College. She began her career at Ripon in 1973, just a year after Title IX was put into effect, governing intercollegiate athletic programs for women.
When asked about her adolescence, Coach Coll described herself as a tomboy because she always wanted to be around sports:
I don’t know if anybody remembers tomboys and so I liked to hang around the little league field, you know and see if I could get anybody to show up and we could play ball or something. So I always liked sports. I wanted to be able to play, but there was no place to play.
