News around campus and beyond
McDaniel College has announced the addition of women’s wrestling to the intercollegiate athletics program. The team is slated to start competition in the fall of 2024 and increase the total number of athletic teams at McDaniel to 25.
One of the fastest-growing sports in high school, women’s wrestling is rapidly expanding at the collegiate level. According to the National Wrestling Coaches Association, the number of female high school wrestlers has exploded from just 804 in 1994 to more than 50,000 in 2023. In addition, the National Federation of State High School Associations reports that the number of high school girls participating in wrestling has increased 55% since 2021-22. Today, 44 states offer separate state wrestling championships for girls.
At the collegiate level, women’s wrestling is currently offered at 169 institutions and became an NCAA emerging sport in 2020-21. Based on the most recent participation rate, women’s wrestling is on track to become the NCAA’s 91st championship and is the highlighted sport among the six existing NCAA Emerging Sports for Women.
McDaniel’s women’s wrestling program will become the 61st Division III program, the third Centennial Conference program, and the first Division III collegiate program in Maryland.
In 2023, President Emerita Joan Develin Coley was honored alongside 26 other Maryland leaders as a recipient of the seventh annual The Daily Record Icon Honors awards. The Icon Honors awards recognize Maryland business leaders over the age of 60 for their notable success and demonstration of strong leadership both within and outside of their chosen field.
Coley is a leader forever entwined with the over 150-year-old story of McDaniel College. Her legacy lives on as the first woman president and first to be promoted from the faculty ranks, along with leading the college’s name change and the largest fundraising campaign in McDaniel history.
According to Thomas Baden Jr., the editor of The Daily Record, all of the Icon Honors award recipients “have left an indelible mark on their chosen fields; have displayed sustained leadership and integrity; have withstood the whims and caprices of the moment to build what is lasting and durable; have the vision to see what is meaningful and the drive and determination to achieve those goals; and have lifted up their colleagues and displayed selfless community service.”
Congratulations, President Emerita Joan Develin Coley, and thank you for your continued commitment to McDaniel College!
Walter Olson has been elected to the McDaniel College Board of Trustees. A former parent visitor to the board, Olson is a senior fellow at the Cato Institute’s Robert A. Levy Center for Constitutional Studies. His son, Tim, graduated from McDaniel in May 2023 with a bachelor’s degree in Environmental Studies.