Winning A Mans Game with Rhonda Taylor

Published: March 12, 2020, 4:01 a.m.

b"Rhonda Taylor is the Director of Partnerships at Fuel50 and a former hockey player. In addition to being a founding member of the Ontario Women\\u2019s Hockey Association (OWH), Rhonda was the first female to ever sit on Hockey Canada\\u2019s Board of Directors. She and Mike Wood discuss her recent book, the women\\u2019s hockey program, and the struggles endured to create it.\\n\\nOffside\\nRhonda wrote her book, Offside, in parallel with the development of women's ice hockey and the women's movement. She is passionate about women moving forward in the sports and business communities. The book is an anecdotal history lesson about the evolution of women\\u2019s hockey and the numerous challenges women faced to make ice hockey a socially acceptable sport for females to play in Canada.\\xa0\\nA Man\\u2019s Game\\nIce hockey was a male dominated field when Rhonda first started playing, which put her in the spotlight for criticism and discrimination. Luckily, Rhonda was hired for the women\\u2019s development program, but although she had a seat on the board she was not given the right to vote. This motivated her to fight for women to obtain the opportunity to play the game. Rhonda comments that today in Canada and the US, the male hockey programs are losing players to other sports, and the women\\u2019s programs are driving hockey at the national level.\\xa0\\nThe Evolution\\nIn the early eighties, the evolution of women's sports came along. Rhonda recounts how the women's hockey program came together. She put all her assets on the line, went around knocking on doors for sponsors, and eventually got funding and approval from the administrative bodies. They were not greeted with a warm reception, but they achieved what they set out to do.\\n\\nResources\\nRhondaLeemanTaylor.com\\nRhonda Taylor on LinkedIn | Twitter\\nOFFSIDE: - A Memoir - Challenges Faced by Women in Hockey"