This profile (below) on 2011 CoSIDA Trailblazer Award recipient
Debby Jennings, University of Tennessee Associate Athletic Director for Media Relations, is the 16th in a series of profiles and features on CoSIDA's 2011 Special Awards recipients.
See link to original release and the March/April/May schedule of the Special Award profiles/features, below.
THE CoSIDA SPECIAL AWARDS FEATURES SERIES
March
Tue. 1 Special Awards general announcement
Thr. 3 Capital One Academic All-America Hall of Fame release
Thr. 3 Ann King (The Sage Colleges): 25-Year Award
Tue. 8 Kent Cherrington (Plymouth State University): 25-year Award
Thr. 10 Justin Doherty (University of Wisconsin): Arch Ward Award
Tue. 15 Rob Knox (Kutztown University): Rising Star Award (College Division)
Thr. 17 Jim Daves (University of Virginia): 25-Year Award
Tue. 22 Diane Nordstrom (University of Wisconsin): 25-Year Award
Thr. 24 Chevonne Mansfield (SWAC): Rising Star Award (University Division)
Tue. 29 Dr. Bill Smith (University of Arkansas): Bob Kenworthy Community Service Award
Thr. 31 Kevin Ruple (Baldwin-Wallace College): Lester Jordan Award
April
Tue. 5 Rich Herman (Clarion): CoSIDA Hall of Fame & Warren Berg Award
Thr. 7 Paul Madison (Western Washington): CoSIDA Hall of Fame
Tue. 12 Charles Bloom (Southeastern Conference): CoSIDA Hall of Fame
Thr. 14 Thomas Nelson (St. Cloud State University): 25-Year Award
Thr. 21 Mark Beckenbach (Ohio Northern): CoSIDA Hall of Fame
Tue. 26 Brian DePasquale (University of Albany): 25-Year Award
Thr. 28 Debby Jennings (University of Tennessee): Trailblazer Award
May
Tue. 3 Walt Riddle (Saint Leo University): Lifetime Achievement Award; and 25-Year Award
Fri. 6 Tom Kroeschell (Iowa State): 25-Year Award
Tue. 10 Mike Moran (USOC); Lifetime Achievement Award
Thr. 12 Joe Seil (Nazareth): 25-Year Award
Tue. 17 A. John Pearson (Kansas Collegiate Athletic Conference): Lifetime Achievement Award
Thr. 19 David Moross (Colorado College): 25-Year Award
Tue. 24 Dan McDonald (Northwestern State [La.] and Southwestern Louisiana: CoSIDA Hall of Fame
Thr. 26 Dave Beyer (Mercer University): 25-Year Award
Tue. 31 Lee Corso (ABC/ESPN Sports): Jade Wade Award
other profiles in the schedule to be announced; schedule subject to change
written by Eric Trainer, Tennessee Associate Director of Media Relations
When sharing stories of how her long affiliation with the University of Tennessee began,
Debby Jennings has jokingly said that her parents dropped her off to attend college in Knoxville in the fall of 1973, and they never came back to pick her up.
That her loving parents, Jack and Mae Jennings, may have executed a perfect drop-and-run with their daughter and high-tailed it back to their home in Connecticut at the time makes for a humorous and memorable anecdote.
It’s that sort of wit and creative storytelling that has enabled Debby Jennings to enjoy a highly-decorated 34-year career in college sports information/media relations, spending every moment serving the university where her folks left her all those years ago.
Since 1977, when she accepted a graduate assistant position as the school’s first sports information director for women’s athletics, Jennings has been the only person to lead the Lady Vol Sports Information/Media Relations Office. Quite impressively, she established an office where there wasn’t one, and she became a pioneer in a field where there were few women at the time. She did so while asking for nothing but a fair shake.
Jennings, an Associate Athletics Director for Media Relations at UT since 1998, can reflect on a career that began as a one-person “shop” and gradually developed into an extended family of full-time, graduate, undergraduate and volunteer staff members through her three decades at Rocky Top. Many of those folks are CoSIDA members and have found success following the instinctual roadmap and compass-like principles their mentor instilled in them.
A 1977 UT journalism graduate, Jennings’ keen ability to convey her ideas through words and images has resulted in either her or staff members garnering nearly 400 CoSIDA publications awards for media guides, game programs or posters. In turn, those publicity pieces have resulted in thousands of story ideas that wound up in print or on the air during radio, television or internet broadcasts.
While she once handled day-to-day media activities for every women’s sport Tennessee sponsored, Jennings’ primary responsibilities during the past 25 years have revolved around the eight-time NCAA champion Lady Vol basketball team and hall of fame coach Pat Summitt. The UT SID has been crucial in telling the world those stories, and clearly she has been instrumental in her own right in helping that sport, the student-athletes and coaching staff earn the media coverage they enjoy today.
Despite Jennings' daily pursuit of recognition and accolades for others, her own personal excellence has not gone unnoticed. The CoSIDA Hall of Fame opened its doors to her in 2002 as its third female inductee. She also was enshrined into the Greater Knoxville Sports Hall of Fame in 2009 and into the Tennessee Sports Writers Association Hall of Fame in 2010.
After becoming the first SID to win the WBCA’s Mel Greenberg Award for lifelong contributions to women’s basketball in 1995, and the first female president of the Southeastern Conference sports information directors from 2000-02, Jennings became only the second woman to earn the prestigious CoSIDA Arch Ward Award in 2008. The Arch Ward is given to a University division member of CoSIDA for outstanding contributions to the athletic communications profession, and who by his or her activities, has brought dignity and prestige to the profession.
All of those firsts and pioneer moments have no doubt been special to Jennings and her close-knit family, which convenes in Knoxville, Atlanta or at the beach when her busy schedule allows.
However, it is what she has done with the chance she was given, the example she has provided and the opportunities that have been created for others, that have led her to most-deservedly become CoSIDA’s 11th recipient of the Trailblazer Award.
Trailblazer Award Recipients
2011 Debby Jennings (University of Tennessee)
2010 Christine Plonsky (Texas)
2009 Rosa Gatti (ESPN)
2008 Langston Rogers (Mississippi)
2007 Anne Abicht (St. Cloud State)
2006 Debbie Byrne (Old Dominion)
2005 Bill Hamilton (South Carolina State)
2004 Joyce Aschenbrenner (V Foundation)
2003 June Stewart (Vanderbilt)
2002 Collie J. Nicholson (Grambling State-retired)
2001 Mary Jo Haverbeck (Penn State-retired)