Donna Kirk: Sr. Associate Athletic Director at UNF
In this episode, Beau and I discuss NCAA rules and regulations in college sports with compliance officer Donna Kirk. We learn what kind of person likes this work: detail-oriented and meticulous, and Donna’s unlikely path to land in this career.
We also discuss how rules are created out of need, shaped by changing circumstances, rely on interpretation, and are grounded in original intent. Rules in sports are familiar to us as mechanisms for social interaction and community building, so familiar that we might miss how they help us construct community and reflect our society’s understandings of fairness, mercy, individualism, community, success, leadership, and conformity.
One aspect of sports at the collegiate level that becomes very clear in this conversation is its need to adapt to changing financial and social pressures. Through this process of assessment and reinterpretation, the NCAA reflects and influences the values of our society.
