Quinnipiac University’s new club for women in sports, Women’s Sideline Society, was created this semester to empower Quinnipiac students and promote a safe space for women interested in sports and sports media.
Maria Keegan, a sophomore advertising 3+1 major, created the club.
“I just started to realize one day that we didn’t have a club that was strictly for women who wanted to pursue a career in this field, especially since this field is pretty male dominated,” she said.
Earlier this semester Keegan bounced the idea around with her friends who felt the same way. They gathered a group of girls interested in creating this club and got the ball rolling. Their first meeting was held on Tuesday, Oct. 21.
“Maria came to me with the idea and I thought it was amazing,” Vice President Sofia Troscianecki, a sophomore media studies major, said.
Troscianecki noted the club’s goal.
“We really want to engage our girls to have that sense of community and just make them feel empowered so that they don’t feel like they’re in someone else’s shadow when they go into the sports world,” Troscianecki said.
Their goal is to create a space for women interested in sports to connect and share experiences, something that is lacking at Quinnipiac.
However, this is not the first time that Quinnipiac had a similar organization. The Association for Women in Sports Media is a national organization that supports women in sports media, as both students and professionals.
Quinnipiac’s chapter of AWSM disbanded in 2024 after the advisor for the organization — former Chair of Journalism department Molly Yanity — left Quinnipiac.
“We didn’t really have the bandwidth to keep going,” Brianna Trachtenberg, former vice president of AWSM at Quinnipiac said.
When asked about Women’s Sideline Society she said, “I think it’s awesome that they are trying to bring something back to Quinnipiac.”
Trachtenberg agrees that Quinnipiac is missing a space for women in sports media to connect with each other.
“It is definitely a space that is needed at Quinnipiac. For me especially, my first years provided more of a support group of AWSM that I could go to and talk to and meet other women in sports, because there are only so many of us,” she said.
Even though participation of female students in student sports media have increased in the last few years, they are still experiencing difficulty in the classroom as they enter a male dominated field.
“I’m kind of intimidated about speaking up in class when it comes to referring to sports, even though it’s what I love doing,” Troscianecki said.
Keegan agreed with this sentiment.
“You start to get this feeling where you feel like your opinion isn’t as valued, or you feel like you can’t speak up during certain conversations because they think; ‘what does she know?’” Keegan said.
These feelings are what motivated the creation of the Women’s Sideline Society.
“I want to create that safe space for girls who feel the way that Sophia and I had felt since freshman year,” Keegan said.
They hope this club will give female students a place to express themselves and form connections within the sports industry. They have the support of older students who are hoping to see the new club pick up where they left off.
“I just hope that they are able to be successful and able to bring back this space to Quinnipiac,” Trachtenberg said.
Keegan and Troscianecki want to fill the space left by AWSM and expand on what they were able to offer.
“We want to include media in our club, but also business, finance, literally anything that has to do with sports,” Troscianecki said.
They plan to reach out to other student organizations, interested professors, as well as female athletes at Quinnipiac as valuable resources to support the club.
The new club is not just for students in sports media programs. It is designed to support interest in sports “as fans, athletes, or future professionals,” Keegan said.
They plan to host networking and resume building workshops as well as interviews with professionals working in the sports industry. They hope to become a resource to make the sports industry accessible for students.
“We want to eventually bring some of our girls to arenas around us, or stadiums and possibly talk to women professionals or maybe even get the chance to shadow women in the field.” Troscianecki said.
They are excited to grow the Women’s Sideline Society and are looking forward to the future of women in sports media at Quinnipiac.
Students interested in joining Women’s Sideline Society can follow their instagram @wssquinnipiac and find them on Bobcat Central.
