Cronkite School launches Women Leaders in Sports Media live-learn program


Group of women pose for a photo.

Members of Women Leaders in Sports Media pose with Charli Turner Thorne (center), basketball scout, former Phoenix Mercury assistant coach and ASU women’s basketball coach. Photo courtesy of the Cronkite School

Women in a new sports media program at Arizona State University got a solid game plan from a sports veteran at an Aug. 20 welcome event.

“Be humble, be consistent and be a solver,” Charli Turner Thorne — basketball scout, former Phoenix Mercury assistant coach and ASU women’s basketball coach — advised the Cronkite School of Journalism and Mass Communication’s inaugural cohort of Women Leaders in Sports.

“Challenges are going to be there. You have to be ready for it, have the right mindset, be a go-getter, and be true to your character and integrity.”

Women Leaders in Sports Media (WLSM) is a new live-learn community empowering undergraduate women pursuing sports journalism degrees as leaders within sports media and the Cronkite School. 

WLSM members are incoming first-time, first-year students with a high school GPA of 3.5 or higher admitted to the bachelor’s degree in sports journalism program and who reside together in the Gordon Commons residence hall on ASU’s Downtown Phoenix campus. 

Members receive partial scholarships, as well as membership to the Association for Women in Sports Media, and access to exclusive programming and special outings throughout their undergraduate careers.

The inaugural WLSM cohort features 12 women representing seven states, from Hawaii to Arizona to New York. (Their favorite professional athletic teams are just as varied: The group includes fans of the Arizona Diamondbacks, Vancouver Canucks, San Francisco 49ers, Scuderia Ferrari Formula 1 and the Mexican national football team.) Four students are the first in their families to attend college, and two are students in Barrett, The Honors College.

“We launched Women Leaders in Sports Media to position these high-achieving women as leaders in the Cronkite School community from the very start of their academic careers,” said Jessica Pucci, senior associate dean. 

“Each year, this sisterhood of trailblazers will grow, and as they connect with media professionals, athletes and each other, they’ll form a network that will undoubtedly change the future of sports media.”

Shortly after WLSM was created in spring 2024, an anonymous donor generously stepped forward to support the program’s launch and provide scholarships for initial members.

“Media is best served when a diversity of voices are telling the stories,” said Professor of Practice Paola Boivin, who teaches in the Cronkite News Phoenix Sports Bureau.

Boivin, who also serves as the faculty adviser for the Cronkite chapter of the Association for Women in Sports Media, worked for two decades as a sports writer and columnist with the Arizona Republic before joining the school to teach sports journalism and mentor early-career women.

“Although I’ve seen strides in the amount of women that are in the sports media industry since I started, the numbers are nowhere near what they should be. We want to help change that,” she said.

Turner Thorne, the winningest coach in Sun Devil women’s basketball history, left WLSM members with wise leadership advice: “Be women who support other women — even better, women who empower other women,” she said. “Helping someone else is never going to hurt you.”

Women Leaders in Sports Media is made possible by the generous supporters who believe in the power of women to advance sports journalism and communication. Make a gift to support WLSM today.

More Law, journalism and politics

 

A stack of four pizza boxes

How to watch an election

Every election night, adrenaline pumps through newsrooms across the country as journalists take the pulse of democracy. We gathered three veteran reporters — each of them faculty at the Walter…

A group of students stand as someone talks at a lectern emblazoned with the ASU logo.

Law experts, students gather to celebrate ASU Indian Legal Program

Although she's achieved much in Washington, D.C., Mikaela Bledsoe Downes’ education is bringing her closer to her intended destination — returning home to the Winnebago tribe in Nebraska with her…

Palo Verde Blooms

ASU Law to honor Africa’s first elected female head of state with 2025 O’Connor Justice Prize

Nobel Peace Prize laureate Ellen Johnson Sirleaf, the first democratically elected female head of state in Africa, has been named the 10th recipient of the O’Connor Justice Prize.The award,…