Organizational values and women's sport at the University of Texas, 1918-1992

This study chronicles the organizational evolution of women's competitive sport at The University of Texas at Austin from 1918 to 1992. This history is examined from a theoretical framework focused on the organizational values of key female administrators and explores the basis and development of those values. Two factors are revealed to have had high influence on the organizational values of these leaders: their level of involvement in and commitment to national governing bodies of women's sport, and national ideologies about sports for women. In addition, this study explores how the gendered power struggles for control of women's college sport played out at one nationally prominent university and provides fresh insights into the extent and manner in which female administrators were able to maintain control of women's sport and shape it in line with their ideals, even after they lost the national battle for control in the early 1980s. This history fills an important gap in women's collegiate sport history as it reveals that UT has consistently been at the forefront of providing athletic opportunities to women throughout the twentieth century, first under the leadership of Anna Hiss and then Donna Lopiano.Kinesiology and Health Educatio