From University of Rochester Athletics

Jane Possee, longtime coach and athletic administrator at the University of Rochester, will receive a major award from the nation's largest athletic conference later this fall.
 
Possee will receive the Katherine Ley Award from the Eastern College Athletic Conference at the ECAC's 2014 Honors Dinner on September 28. The dinner kicks off a three-day period filled with meetings and panel discussions. It will be held at the Sea Crest Resort in North Falmouth, Massachusetts.
 
The ECAC is the nation's largest athletic conference with more than 300 members among Divisions I, II, and III. Geographically, it stretches from Maine to North Carolina.
 
This is the third major award presented to Possee since the start of the 2014 calendar year. In February, she received the Susan B. Anthony Lifetime Achievement Award from the Susan B. Anthony Center for Women's Leadership at the University. In June, she received the Jean Giambrone Service Award from the Rochester Press-Radio Club.
 
The Susan B. Anthony Award was established in 1997 to honor and celebrate women whose lives have been enriched by their years at the University of Rochester and who have inspired other women to advance and lead.
 
The Jean Giambrone Service Award was established in 1982 to be presented to a person who has made an exemplary lifetime commitment to local women's sports. Giambrone '42, wrote sports for the Rochester Times-Union and covered all levels – from basketball teams coached by Possee at Rochester to the Master's. Giambrone was inducted into the University's Athletics Hall of Fame in 2004.
 
Katherine Ley was one of the founders of the Commission on Intercollegiate Athletics for Women in 1966, the forerunner of the Association of Intercollegiate Athletics for Women (AIAW). After serving a 12-year tenure at the State University College at Cortland as chair of Physical Education and Athletics for Women, Ley became athletics director at Capital University in Ohio. At the time, she was one of only two women athletic administrators heading both men's and women's athletics.
 
The award in her name honors an eastern women's athletics administrator who is a strong proponent of women's issues; a creator of programs and opportunities for women in athletics; a role model for women coaches and administrators; and a person of demonstrated leadership, one who has the ability to make things happen and the ability to work with others.
 
Those qualities all fit Possee well. Over four decades, she has been instrumental in transformation of the University's women's athletics program from a bare-bones existence in the 1970s to the highly competitive Division III teams of today, Throughout this transformation, Possee also coached student-athletes to become confident leaders on and off the field.
 
After the introduction of Title IX, Possee pushed for new opportunities and support for female athletes at the University, including a daily practice schedule, use of the alumni gym, and full-time coaches. Leading this charge for equitable resources for the University's female athletes and teams, she changed the culture at the University, encouraging more women to compete at the highest levels. Originally hired to coach Rochester's women's basketball and field hockey teams, Possee also started and coached the women's lacrosse team. It operated as a club program for three years and was elevated to varsity status in 1979.
 
Possee graduated from Skidmore College in 1972 and enrolled at Syracuse. As a graduate student at Syracuse, she was the head coach of field hockey and was later named head coach of the women's swimming and diving team. She also started a women's lacrosse program at Syracuse. She arrived at Rochester in 1975.
 
In 1992, Possee transitioned from coaching to administration at Rochester where she currently oversees the operation of the Robert B. Goergen Athletic Center and all the recreational programs sponsored by the Department of Athletics and Recreation.
 
Her campus reach is wide-ranging. She has served on innumerable committees, stretching from orientation to parking, from Human Resources to Meliora (Homecoming) Weekend. She coordinated department capital projects for improvements to just about every athletic facility, indoors and outdoors.
 
An endowment has been established in Possee's name to enhance the athletic opportunities for female students at the University of Rochester. Its funds will be used to augment the annual budget for women's athletic programming, including national recruiting, enhanced video equipment and software, enhanced gear, unbudgeted post-season expenses, and foreign travel. The endowment was announced at a mid-March seminar on Title IX when many of her alumni returned to campus to talk to current athletes about networking opportunities.