Amy Cooper continues to make history: She was named Augsburg University’s new athletic director earlier this spring and assumed her new duties June 1 as the school’s first Black AD.
Cooper, a Minneapolis native, helped the University of St. Thomas through its transition from Division III to DI as senior associate athletics director. “I think everything in my career has led me to be prepared for this,” she told the MSR shortly after assuming the AU position.
Among her first tasks was to hire KiJuan Ware as the school’s first Black head football coach. She recently hired Christa Burgess as senior associate AD, who brings more than eight years of leadership experience in athletic administration, most recently as Trinity Washington (D.C.) University athletic director.
Reflecting on her time at UST, “There’s so many things at St. Thomas” she was responsible for, Cooper pointed out. “I was over the finances, compliance, and reclassification, so all of that was just a huge learning process.
“The reclassification project was very unique, something I had not done before. We grew the [athletics] budget about five times what it was in Division III. St. Thomas had never done [athletic] financial aid awards.”
Cooper, who grew up in South Minneapolis, played multiple sports at Washburn before going off to Howard University and playing soccer at the only HBCU women’s soccer program at the time. There she became the first Black college female player to earn all-conference honors. She later was an associate athletics director at HU, then Trinity University AD.
Cooper also coached at South Carolina State, Southwest Minnesota State, and Prairie View A&M before setting down for an athletic administration career. Along the way, she kept making history.
“My coaching experience I think makes me a unique candidate for this position,” she continued. “Having coached at the Division I, II and III levels, I think that gives me a unique perspective when it comes to [her job].”
Cooper joins St. Scholastica AD Jessica Cherry as the only Black female athletic directors in the MIAC. Christine Hester in the late 1990s was the first Black woman AD when she was hired at Bethel.
Located in the shadow of the larger University of Minnesota in the Cedar-Riverside area, Augsburg boasts over 400 student-athletes and 22 varsity sports. Cooper, who reports directly to the school president, is now responsible to help ensure, along with the coaches, that the Auggies male and female players receive the kind of athletic and academic experience they sought when they decided to attend the school.
“I’m a product of South Minneapolis and went to Minneapolis Public Schools,” stressed Cooper. “I walked the same streets that our Augsburg student athletes walk. I played soccer in the dome here at Augsburg growing up.”
And now, as AU’s first Black head of athletics, she said, “It’s exciting to be here because I didn’t have people that looked like me necessarily to look up to. It’s about representation. What I love about Augsburg is that they are growing and growing their number of BIPOC students. I think we’re at 58% here, which is definitely the top private school diversity rate in the state.”
“There is so much opportunity here for us to partner with the community, and that’s what I’m really looking forward to doing. Less than two miles from here, we have the YWCA. We’ve got South High School in this community. We’ve got Phillips Community Center.
“My hope is — and I know our athletic program here has done a lot of good work in the past — I want to continue with that and build more partnerships so that our student athletes can be mentors to these students in Minneapolis like me when I was young,” said Cooper.
“I’m looking forward to our students going out there in the community and being visible for these kids in our community, too,” she concluded.
Charles Hallman welcomes reader comments to challman@spokesman-recorder.com.