The University of Texas at Austin Athletics
Conradt to be honored with TAHPERD Pathfinder Award
12.03.2009 | Women's Basketball
Dec. 3, 2009
Former Texas Women's Basketball coach Jody Conradt will be honored in Arlington, Texas on Friday night as this year's recipient of the TAHPERD Pathfinder Award. The award recognizes women in the state of Texas who have shown dedication to the advocacy, recruitment and enhancement of girls and women in sport.
The TAHPERD award qualifies Conradt for consideration for the National Association of Girls and Women and Sports (NAGWS) national Pathfinder Award.
It's a fitting honor for Conradt, who devoted 31 years to the enhancement of young women as women's basketball coach for the Longhorns, before retiring in 2007, and adds a poignant conclusion to a week that also saw Conradt honored by The University.
The Jody Conradt Endowed Excellence Fund has been established at UT to inspire and instruct students on the importance of leadership and equity and to promote faculty research in that area. The endowment will be held by the College of Liberal Arts on behalf of the Center for Women's and Gender Studies.
The endowment will support the Texas Undergraduate Leadership Program, which provides stipends, mentoring, workshops and community service opportunities to 10 women from each undergraduate class. The students must come from groups that are underrepresented on campus or study disciplines in which women are underrepresented.
It's believed that this is the first time an academic endowment on campus has been created to honor a women's coach.
"It is both gratifying and humbling to be associated with this Excellence Fund, which will advance, enrich and educate women students," Conradt said. "One of the most rewarding aspects of coaching and athletics administration was witnessing the maturation, confidence-building and empowerment of undergraduate women."