One of golf’s eternal questions is how to get more women involved. Roughly one-quarter of all golfers are female and, although there is encouraging evidence that young girls are coming to golf at a much higher clip than historic norms, considerable work remains to tear down the remnants of old barriers.
Caddying is one of those areas of concern. Only about 2 percent of all caddies are female, a reality that is apparent upon walking through the gates at many prominent private clubs and resorts with robust caddie programs. For most of golf’s history, caddying has skewed sharply toward men because of male-dominated memberships at clubs and a perception that women couldn’t handle the physical demands of the job or understand the nuances of the game. Now that some of those dynamics are changing and old stigmas have been proven to be ridiculous, there is a real opportunity and desire for young women to get involved in caddying.
Where does that start and what meaningful progress can be made? No organization is doing more to answer those questions than the Western Golf Association Caddie Academy, home to 110 teenage girl caddies across four chapters in Chicago, Philadelphia, Minneapolis and Seattle. The program started in Chicago 10 years ago with just a dozen girls and is now rapidly expanding to where new chapters are slated to open in the coming years, including in Columbus, Ohio, next year.
Academy members have the opportunity to live in Evans Scholar houses on college campuses during the seven-week program each summer. The program includes test prep, college visits, field trips, guest speakers and caddie opportunities. More than 100 graduates of the academy have gone on to be awarded an Evans scholarship. The average household income of a participant is $30,000, about 90 percent of the participants are of color and, in most instances, academy graduates are the first members of their families to attend college.
“The big pull was those social connections and that community building and just how much the golfers really cared for us. ... our club really took care of us and made sure we all felt safe and secure at all times.”
Kara Chin is the director of the academy and one of the driving forces behind the exponential growth. She knows the power of caddying and what it can do for young women because she has lived those experiences.
Raised in a golf-focused family, Chin followed her brother into caddying at Glen Oak Country Club in Glen Ellyn, Illinois, and went on to graduate from the University of Illinois in 2012 after receiving an Evans Scholarship.
“I caddied every summer for seven years,” Chin told Global Golf Post. “The big pull was those social connections and that community building and just how much the golfers really cared for us. We had our core little group of young women that caddied together, and our club really took care of us and made sure we all felt safe and secure at all times.
Along the way, Chin realized how much of an impact caddying had on her life. Every day became a new lesson in how to interact with people. She references walking into a friend’s house during high school and being immediately comfortable with starting a conversation with their parents.
“She was like, ‘Why are you talking to my parents?’ ” Chin said with a laugh. “And you know, it's just this skill that kind of innately becomes part of you if you're caddying. It was something I didn't recognize probably when I was younger, but now I certainly realize the value in that.”
Chin earned a teaching degree from Illinois, and she taught fourth and fifth grade in the years after college. During the summer, she worked as a counselor at the academy where she lived with students to ensure they had a positive experience. That eventually led to her role now where she counsels current Evans Scholars college students – most of whom are caddie academy grads – and current caddie academy students. That connection continues all the way to when they start their professional careers, and caddying often remains a part of their lives in some capacity.
Female participation has continued to grow to where 33 percent of the nearly 1,100 Evans Scholars nationwide are female.
“The beauty of it is that really the biggest spokespeople for it are the current scholars and the older participants,” Chin said. “I attribute the growth of it to students going back to their high schools and really telling their own success stories. Students tell younger students, ‘Yeah, I went away for seven weeks for the first time as a 14-year-old, 15-year-old, and it completely changed my life.’
“I'm seeing them change from their freshman year of high school through their senior year of college. The maturity, the leadership … you can't even begin to describe how incredible it is to see them go from point A to point B.”
We are all looking for firm evidence that the staid golf establishment can adapt, normalizing female caddies who have just as much expertise and ability as their male counterparts. It won’t change overnight, but progress can be made.
Consider that Inverness Club, the famous Donald Ross layout in Toledo, Ohio, has made it a point to employ young women in its 250-person caddie program. Now 22 percent of caddies in that program are female, and many of them are Evans Scholarship recipients. Inverness recruits at local schools with open arms, ensuring kids that gender or golf knowledge doesn’t matter. If they are willing to learn, they are welcome. More clubs will need to embrace that mentality.
For other clubs in certain parts of the country, just finding young women is a considerable challenge. Changing that issue will take time, but if programs like the WGA Caddie Academy continue to grow and clubs like Inverness open their doors to all newcomers, the face of youth caddying – and full-time adult caddies – will begin to change.