Feb. 27, 2012
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When Robert Vowels was brought to Nashville as the assistant athletic director for compliance in 1990, he was the first African-American to hold a senior position in the Vanderbilt athletic department. Vowels credits then-athletic director Paul Hoolahan with changing the mindset around Commodore athletics.
“It really goes back to Paul Hoolahan’s vision and commitment to diversity and inclusion,” Vowels said. “We wanted to better understand [the African-American] student-athlete experience and how it could be improved. The growth on the athletic administrator side was a logical next phase in the commitment to diversity after better understanding the student-athlete experience.”
Vowels recognized that he was a trailblazer and tried to set a positive example.
“I wanted to do well and learn the business because I did realize that more opportunities would develop for other talented ethnic minority administrators,” he said.
Vowels has excelled at every level of athletic administration. A graduate of Duke and North Carolina Central Law School, Vowels currently serves as the vice president of student-athlete affairs for the NCAA. He also spent six years as the commissioner of the Southwestern Athletic Conference after working with the Big Ten and the Southern Intercollegiate Athletic Conference.
Vanderbilt’s commitment to diversity has not wavered in the past 20 years. It is part of Vice Chancellor David Williams’ belief that doing things the right way leads to success.
“When you stick to that core values system–diversity, academics, integrity–the other things work themselves out because you’re doing it for the right reasons,” Williams said. “We’re not going to do diversity just for diversity’s sake, but we are going to have things open for all people, and we’re going to celebrate the diversity it creates.”
