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The Women’s Coaching Alliance
Developing female leaders through coaching youth sports. WCA is delivering a deep pipeline of confident female leaders so together we can close the leadership gap.
How Elevate and WCA connect
WCA’s own girls flag football league
Elevate is a Women’s Coaching Alliance league. WCA recruits, trains, and mentors the young women who coach every Elevate team, through its Coach Today, Lead for Life™ program.
Girls get coaches they can look up to. Coaches get real leadership experience, with a mentor and a community of peers behind them.
“(WCA) is an organization that is rooted in empowering women to lead. And coaching is where that happens in so many ways. As a man, I need to step aside and a woman needs to coach girls flag football. Women need to be qualified and we need to get thousands of women coaching flag.”
Steve Young, Elevate co-founder · Pro Football Hall of Fame Quarterback, San Francisco 49ers
Why it matters
The coaching gap
While female athletes are making strides at achieving gender parity on the field, representation in the boardroom and among coaches still lags behind.
The program
Coach Today, Lead for Life™
WCA’s signature leadership program serves young women athletes in their formative years (ages 15–26) and builds their foundational leadership skills and confidence through coaching youth sports.
Throughout her journey, she is supported by a mentor, a community of peers and an evidence based curriculum so she not only sees her potential to lead, but also has the confidence to achieve it. Even better, by increasing female representation, a virtuous cycle begins, inspiring the next generation.
Leadership skills WCA coaches build
- Adaptability
- Navigating conflict
- Communication
- Decision-making
- Motivating others
- Confidence
How it all started
“Where are all the women coaches?”
The Women's Coaching Alliance was born from the vision of Pam Baker, who sought to honor the legacy of her beloved husband, Doug Friedman. Doug was a firm believer in the power of sports to shape the lives of girls and develop lasting confidence. But when he went to coach their daughters’ teams, he often found himself asking, “Where are all the women coaches?”
WCA honors him by growing the number of inspiring women coaches and a pipeline of future leaders.
Meet Pam BakerWhat WCA believes
Core values
Inspire
We believe that each of us has in us more than we ever believe or think possible.
Learning & Growth
We believe that confidence is developed over time, through trial and error, through successes and misses.
Empower
We believe leadership is not a zero-sum game and that we are all better off when more of us take the reins to lead in our own unique ways.
Community
We believe that we stretch ourselves further when we have the support and trust of those around us.
Accountability
We believe that teams work best when we’re clear on our responsibilities.
Humor
We believe in not taking ourselves too seriously. That laughter is a most powerful medicine.
Learn more at womenscoachingalliance.org.