Women's collegiate soccer coaching in the United States: exploring barriers and challenges

Our primary purpose was to explore and describe perceived barriers and challenges women encounter coaching National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA) Division I soccer. The secondary purposes were: (1) examine the alignment of barriers and challenges with the Ecological Intersectional Model, (2) assess how barriers and challenges are influenced by demographics (i.e. age, degree earned) and coaching status (i.e. job rank, salary). A mixed-methods design was used to collect quantitative and qualitative survey responses. Five emergent themes were identified that female soccer coaches face regardless of their demographics or coaching status: Confidence, Opportunity, Support, Gender Barriers, and Sacrifice. Each emergent theme aligned with at least one level of barriers in the Ecological Intersectional Model. The identified barriers and challenges have largely remained the same over the last fifty years which suggests that there needs to be a more considered analysis of their potential impact on female soccer coaches.