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Data is as Data Does
by Laurie Bollig, CoSIDA Director of Membership Engagement
So as not to rely on anecdotal evidence only, CoSIDA’s Executive Board of Directors has approved funds over the last several years that have allowed us to expand our toolbox and invest in data-gathering software and techniques. A perfect example of this commitment to the membership was last year’s compensation and career satisfaction survey. We partnered with a respected vendor with proven methods and survey tactics and the result was a response rate of 65 percent of our membership — an unusually high rate for a volunteer association. Kudos to our membership!
Recently, we’ve been asked about staff reductions within athletics communications departments as a result of the pandemic. Our answers have mostly been anecdotal because, frankly, that’s all the evidence we had to go on. We were hearing from our members about layoffs and furloughs, but it was strictly either first-person experiences or something we saw on social media.
We decided to ask our members questions concerning how the pandemic changed (or didn’t change) their department. We targeted account custodians in our database — those members who have the ability to add or subtract members from their organization’s roster in the CoSIDA database. Currently, we have 778 members who are designated as custodians. We put together a quick, and unscientific, survey on Google Forms and sent the link to those 778 members. If they weren’t the department head, we asked them to share the link with that person. The survey was open for two weeks. Approximately 39 percent of the custodians responded.
Following is a summary of some of the top responses we received.
Affiliation of Respondents
- NCAA Division I — 32%
- NCAA Division II — 23%
- NCAA Division III — 30%
- NAIA — 10%
- Two-year — 2%
- Canadian — 2%
Question: How many varsity sports are sponsored by your athletic department? (Do not include intramural or subvarsity sports.)
- 0-15 — 71 respondents
- 16-20 — 112
- 21-25 — 83
- 26-30 — 22
- 31 and above — 13
Question: How many full-time staff members comprise your sports information/athletic communications office at this time? If you currently have full-time staff members on furlough who will come back to work in your office, include them in your totals. Include yourself but not students, interns or grad assistants in the total.
- Zero full-time employees — 4
- One full-time employee — 108
- One-and-a-half full-time employees — 2
- Two full-time employees — 99
- Two-and-a-half full time employees — 1
- Three full-time employees — 29
- Four full-time employees — 18
Question: How many full-time positions in athletic communications at your institution have been eliminated since March 1, 2020? (Eliminated, not furloughed) (Do not include graduate assistants, interns or student workers.)
- Zero — 88%
- 1 — 9%
- 2 — 3.4%
Question: If you answered the question above with anything other than zero (0), please select the levels/areas of the eliminated positions.
- Assistant director — 46%
- Department head — 14%
- Social media assistant — 14%
Question: How many full-time positions in athletic communications at your institution have been furloughed for at least five days since March 1, 2020? (Do not include graduate assistants, interns or student workers.)
- Zero — 73%
- 1 — 13%
- 2 — 7%
- 3 — 4%
- More than 5 — 2%
Question: If you answered the question above with anything other than zero (0), please select the levels/areas of the furloughed positions.
- Director or department head — 62%
- Assistant director — 54%
- Associate director — 14%
- Coordinator — 12%
- Video/broadcast — 10%
Question: If your athletic communications department experienced furloughs since March 1, 2020, what was the average length of the furlough?
- More than one month — 45%
- 1-2 weeks — 23%
Question: If you have lost part-time, intern/graduate assistant or student positions in athletic communications since March 1, 2020, select those jobs that were eliminated.
- Student workers — 49%
- Intern (full-time or part-time) — 31%
- Graduate assistant — 16%
We also asked questions about naming conventions for athletics communications departments and where digital/creative/social employees were housed within an athletics department. We got some interesting responses and will share those at a later date.
For now, we asked about layoffs and furloughs and 39 percent of our member organizations responded. To put a spin on the numbers in an unscientific survey would do more damage than good. We trust you can draw your own conclusions.
If you are interested in the full report, reach out to me at
lauriebollig@cosida.com.