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Malcolm Doldron is in his second season with the Columbia women's rowing staff. Originally from Brooklyn, N.Y., Doldron moved to the Washington, D.C. area as a teenager, where he first took up rowing at West Potomac High School in Northern Virginia. After an illustrious rowing career at West Potomac and the Thompson Boat Center, Doldron went on to row at Marietta College in Ohio, where he was the cox for the Pioneers’ varsity eight that earned bronze medals at the 1998 SIRA’s and Dad Vail Regatta.

After graduating from Marietta in 1999 with a B.A. in psychology and education, Doldron went back to Northern Virginia where he embarked on career in teaching and coaching. For seven years, he taught special education at Fairfax High School in Fairfax, Va., while serving as the head coach of rowing at his alma mater, West Potomac -- leading men’s fours to gold at the Scholastic Nationals and silver at the Stotesbury Cup, and both men’s and women’s fours to gold and silver medals at the Virginia State Championships.

Doldron's first collegiate coaching experience came as a volunteer assistant with the Princeton women's rowing program, a position he held for two years. His crews finished second and third at the 2006 and 2007 EAWRC Sprints, both going on to compete at the NCAA Championships.

At Columbia, Doldron has played major roles in coaching and recruiting, leading the Novice Fours to the first Eastern Sprints women’s gold medal in school-history.

What inspired you to get involved in coaching?

It came down to where I was the most happy and where I found myself the most content. I've always felt that I was the most content when I was on the water. When I was rowing in high school and in college, all of my fondest memories were being around my teammates, and whether it be racing, or in some of the more intense practices or just spending time with the athletes, those are always the good memories that come to mind pretty quickly.

I actually started coaching while I was still in college, but after I graduated, I was offered a position to coach at my old high school. I decided it was the right time and I took it and it was just full circle. I started to have those kind of feelings again, and decided to run with it.

What has drawn you to the Ivy League?

There's a lot that I really appreciate about the Ivies. The sense of tradition is so strong. While I was in the DC area, I had the opportunity to coach some of the best athletes around, many of whom went on to row in college and do great things at different universities throughout the country. The ones that went to some of the smaller schools would come back and talk about the lack of a sense of tradition. They felt more of that tradition even rowing at West Potomac High School. But in the Ivies, that tradition is there and it permeates everything. You never feel like you're competing just for yourself -- you're competing for the alumni, and all of those people that came before you. It's just a really cool feeling.

And then the obvious thing is just being around a group of intellectually stimulating people...bright athletes. There is nothing like that.

When I was coaching at the high school, I was also an educator; I taught special education in the Fairfax Public School System. I think everyone has a strong sense of what education can do for a person, but working in special education with the kids that I worked with, it gives you a different understanding of it. To be here now, with these students, is an incredible thing. It keeps me young, it keeps me on my toes.

What are some things that were not expected, or have taken you by surprise so far here as a coach in the League?

Before I was here at Columbia, I was at Princeton for two years. You always hear the misconception that Ivy League students aren't athletes. That's false. There are absolutely outstanding athletes here, throughout the League in all divisions of sport. The big schools may have the big sports -- baseball, basketball, football -- but we have in this League, some of the greatest athletes that I've seen. Not only great athletes but hard working individuals. We attract these type A people to our schools and it doesn't stop in the classroom -- it extends to the field and on the water and onto the court. Just as hard as they are working in the classroom, they are working within their respective sport. Unless you're here, you may think it's something different, but it's not.

Given the resources, what is something you would change with regards to your job?

I have been doing some work with outreach in our sport. Rowing is a sport where the minority base is very small. I've been working with a group of coaches recently on trying to come up with ideas as to why it is this way and what we would need in order to change it. One of the things that I would do, particularly here on an island, is build a community boathouse...something that can allow anyone access. That is something we don't currently have here and to have something like that in the city, that's community-based, that can give anyone the opportunity to try the sport, would be fantastic.

There are programs out there that focus on minority outreach. One that comes to mind is Row New York, based out of Queens. They target young women in their community, and the majority of their team are minorities. They incorporate not only the athletic portion of it, but also the academic portion, so these girls are getting the right stuff. Many of these girls go on to college, many of whom are being recruited by some of the top programs. That's a great example. The Jack London Aquatic Center in Oakland, Calif. is another place making the effort to do great things.

Also, US Rowing has a Task Force on Access, Affordability and Diversity, and they are also looking into this issue of outreach. It's good to see that the sport of rowing is starting to take this more seriously, especially as we start to grow in popularity, particularly with Title IX and access to women. We're just growing and growing. In order to be seen as legitimate, we are going to have to bring on an even larger population and that obviously means reaching out and providing access for different people of different cultures. It can only make the sport better.

What are some of your goals and aspirations?

I definitely want to be a head coach someday. I'm pretty young so I still have time. I'm still learning and I'm also hoping to pursue my Master's in Sport Management here at Columbia. When it comes down to it, my main short-term goal is to do what i can do here, to be the best assistant I can. The overall objective for our program is to compete at the NCAA Championships, and I think we're making some good steps towards it.

Based on your experiences, what can you say to help improve opportunities for minorities in college athletic administration and coaching?

Particularly in the coaching aspect, the business of sport as a coach has always been a meritocracy of sorts. If you've proven that you can do the job then you'll get the next one. The problem is that you need to be allowed the opportunity to be proven. Drawing on my own experiences, I coached many high school and club teams to state and national championships, but when it came time for me to apply for a college coaching position, I got the sense that these places were looking for someone with more collegiate experience. But how are you going to get the collegiate experience if you're not offered a collegiate position? It's all about the opportunity. I was fortunate enough to sort of make my own. I interned at Princeton with the women's program for two years. I worked for free and learned the ropes, and figured out what it was all about. After a couple of years, things started to turn around quite quickly.

That's what the hope is -- that you can find a way and get your foot in the door, and once that door has got a crack in it, do whatever you can do to knock it down. But the opportunity definitely needs to be there.

The Ivy League takes great pride in honoring February as Black History month. For all of the inspiring stories about former athletes that helped shape movements within African-American history, please check out Ivy Black History.

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