About the conference

Losing to Win: Discussions of Race and Intercollegiate Sports, an interdisciplinary conference held at Wake Forest University in 2011.

The conference brought together prominent academics, athletic administrators, sports journalists, former student athletes, professional athletes and other professionals with an expertise in sports to discuss subject including:

• the future financial sustainability of the top-tier intercollegiate athletic programs;
• the persistent graduation rate gap between African American and White student-athletes;
• the negative consequences for athletic programs caused by sports agents;
• recruitment and other improprieties of college coaches and their staffs;
• the proliferation of coaches’ salaries and,
• criminal-related offenses committed by student-athletes.

The conference addressed the racial implications of these and other controversial topics. Panelists discussed topics ranging from student-athlete’s perceptions of mistreatment; stereotype threat (as applied to non-white student-athletes); concerns related to the recruitment of student-athletes of color and their academic and social integration into top-tier institutions; media portrayals of African American student-athletes; and the implications of Title IX gender equity for women student- athletes and coaches of color.