Nationally Respected Sports Journalist Kelly Whiteside Joins Faculty

How do you bring instant national recognition to a brand new degree program? By hiring one of the very best professionals in that field. This is the first year of the Journalism degree program for the School of Communication and Media, and the professional is the esteemed Kelly Whiteside, who joined the faculty this fall as an assistant professor in Sports Media and Journalism. Prior to that, Whiteside spent 14 years at USA Today as the lead Olympics writer, World Cup soccer writer and national college football writer. Prior to joining USA Today, she was a reporter at Newsday and a staff writer at Sports Illustrated.

In spite of her impressive background in journalism, Professor Whiteside says she always knew she would want to teach at some point in her career. She has previously gained teaching experience as an adjunct professor at Columbia University Graduate School of Journalism and has also taught sports journalism part-time at Rutgers University. At MSU this semester she is teaching Writing for the Media, Sports, Media and Society and Cross-Platform Sports Writing.

In her career, she has covered a total of seven Olympics and eight World Cups, as well as the NFL, NBA, Major League Baseball, NHL and major college sports. One thing that she loves about sports writing is that sports and society intersect in so many interesting ways. “I started as an urban affairs writer in graduate school and then I got an internship at Sports Illustrated. From there I realized how you can write about anything when you write about sports: financial issues, legal issues, criminal issues, etc.”

When asked for memorable moments from her time covering the Olympics, she immediately mentioned the historic significance of seeing Gabby Douglas become the first African-American All-Round Gold medal winner in Women’s Gymnastics at the recent summer Games in London. However, another favorite moment for Professor Whiteside was a bit more personal. She recalls being at the 2004 Athens Games covering Women’s Soccer. The US Women’s Soccer teams’ gold medal win that year was very meaningful for Whiteside. She had covered the team through their famous World Cup win in 1999. That team, many of whom were retiring that year, including Mia Hamm, Brandi Chastain and Julie Foudy, is “probably the most important team in the history of women’s sports,” said Whiteside. The team was highly influential in making girls want to play soccer on a team. “Seeing them win the gold – they even wore the laurel wreaths on their heads – it was a great way to see them go out.”

Professor Whiteside also holds the distinction of being the first woman to become president of the Football Writers Association of America (FWAA). For a one year term, she says, “It was an honor to be the face of that organization.” Since she served in 2002, there has not been another woman elected to that office. When asked why she thinks that it, she responded that it’s been too long since she served. “There’s got to be somebody,” she says somewhat puzzled. She believes that there are many women who would do a great job in that role.

Professor Whiteside says that even though we may be seeing more female sportscasters, print and digital media is still lagging behind the times. “There have always been a good number of women who cover the Olympics,” she says. But, for example, when covering college football, “I was often the only woman in the press box.” Professor Whiteside believes that this needs to continue to change.

Professor Whiteside is also the co-author of the book, “A War in Dixie” with Ivan Maisel. The book is an in-depth look at the football rivalry in the state of Alabama between the University of Alabama’s Crimson Tide and the Alburn University Tigers. “In my opinion, it’s the best rivalry in sports,” she says enthusiastically. “Since the state of Alabama has no major league football teams, all the energy is concentrated on these two college teams. It may be hard for people in this part of the country to understand because there is nothing comparable to it here.” In fact, she says it can best be summed up by something that an equipment manager at Alburn once told her. “He said, ‘The best thing about this rivalry is also the worst thing about this rivalry, it means too much to too many people.’”

The move to MSU could not have been more “serendipitous” for Professor Whiteside. She has been a resident of Montclair for a number of years and also has a three-year-old daughter. “It was tough to be away on assignment for weeks at a time.” Now, her daughter actually comes to campus with her and spends the day at the Ben Samuels Children’s Center on campus. However, the fact that the details of this move “fell into place” for her is not the main reason she is happy to be a part of the faculty of MSU. She makes it a point to mention that Journalism is a major for the first time this semester. In addition to that, Sports Journalism in particular is a growing field. Thanks to the internet and the prevalence of sports websites, jobs in sports journalism are plentiful right now and there has been an increase in Sports Journalism programs across the country as well. “So it’s an exciting time for the field and I am very excited to see how we grow in the years to come.”