From NYU Athletics

Senior Meghan Marhan (Glen Ridge, NJ/Glen Ridge) of the women's soccer team and sophomore Jenny Walker (Sausalito, CA/Redwood) of the women's basketball team are using their voices to give back to females in the athletic community across the country.

Working for "Voice In Sport" (VIS), an advocacy platform that connects and inspires female athletes ages 13-22 through a member-only website, the two Violets are using their student-athlete experiences to help promote visibility. VIS creates content specifically for female athletes in the areas of Sports Nutrition, Mental Health, Body, Training, Recovery and Advocacy.

"After Stef Strack (the founder of VIS) shared her mission with us, which was to create this platform around female athletes and advocacy, it really stuck with me," Marhan said. "I was truly inspired by what she was doing and started interning for her last year."

Marhan primarily works with the marketing sector of the platform and helped with the launch late last month. On the VIS Brand team she helped to develop the platform and works closely with the 30 'VIS Creators'™ (college athletes studying journalism and media who write the content published on the platform) and 90 'VIS League™ Members' (professional and collegiate athletes who will serve as mentors for younger female athletes on the platform).

"I chose to work for VIS because as a female athlete I have experienced the lack of visibility and recognition that women's sports receive," Marhan explained. "The disparity is real, significant, and rarely talked about, even today with movements such as the United States Women's National Team's fight for Equal Pay. We've heard that 3.2% of sports media coverage goes to female athletes and professional female athletes' salaries are lower, but not many know that 51% of girls drop out of sport by the age of 17, twice the rate of boys. This is for many reasons, but it's undoubtedly correlated to the inaccurate and unfair perception of female athletes."

Marhan had an outstanding junior season in goal for the Violets, earning Honorable Mention All-UAA (University Athletic Association) accolades. She recorded career highs in minutes played (1,445), wins (11) and saves (64), while also tying a career best with eight shutouts and posting a 0.85 goals against average.
 

"I am marketing major and I have always been super passionate about sports as well as the female athlete experience," Marhan stated. "VIS supplies our members with the tools they need to stay in sport and to have a positive experience. I wish the platform had been available when I was younger."

Walker, who had a standout freshman campaign and has been interning with the VIS social media team, researches postings that advocate for women's sports.

"In the future, I want to work with sports because I love sports," Walker explained. "I felt really lost in the recruiting process, and I just want to help others who may feel the way I did. Everything this platform offers, especially the advocacy tools, are just so helpful to get the message across. We are under-represented in the media, so just to be in a community of female athletes feels empowering."
 
Walker led the Violets in rebounds (169) and blocks (40), while also earning Second Team All-UAA honors. 
 
"VIS not only helps younger athletes, but it helps me as well," Walker added. "I struggle finding the right foods to eat and VIS already has posted several articles about what to eat before or after practice, which I found helpful."