How Veteran journalist Amy Donaldson has spent decades elevating women’s voices in sports coverage

By: Parly Scott

 

A thank-you card from a high school athlete changed how Amy Donaldson viewed sports journalism forever.

After covering high school sports for over 20 years as a reporter for The Deseret News, Donaldson said she received a note from one of the players whose games she'd followed all season. The message thanked her for her coverage, expressing how no media seemed cared about the team’s achievements and how meaningful it was to have a reporter acknowledge their efforts and experiences.

“Saying ‘hey, you're important enough that I showed up to tell your story to the world’ … gave them a level of validation that some of them had not experienced,” she said.

For Donaldson, this realization became a driving force in her decades of work advocating for women in sports, she said, ensuring their accomplishments receive the recognition they deserve in a field traditionally dominated by men's athletics.

High School sports journalism, however, wasn't Donaldson’s original career path — or even an interest at first. 

“I felt that Crime and Corrections was important because everyday someone’s life was in the balance,” she said. “but covering high school games it’s like who cares?”

A reporter for more than 30 years, Donaldson has covered beats from crime and corrections to the Olympics and high school sports. Today, she hosts "The Letter," a true crime podcast at KSL and remains an advocate for women in sports and female journalists covering sports. 

After her daughter was born in 1999 with a congenital heart defect, she knew she needed to have a job with more flexibility. When she returned to work she took a job in high school sports reporting because her boss said it came with more flexibility. 

Donaldson said the transition from crime to high school sports wasn’t easy, and she found herself struggling to see the significance of sports reporting, especially after covering more serious issues. 

She enjoyed covering games, she said, but didn’t feel the same impact from her reporting offering up scores and gameplay commentary. 

“I didn't really feel like that it was important,” she said. “I need that purposeful aspect to my work.”

But then she got assigned the high school sports beat and began reporting on girls’ softball, a sport she played as a teenager in Alaska, she said. When that letter arrived, thanking her for her coverage, a passion was ignited for reporting on sports and paved the way for her to be a voice for all women in the sports industry. 

“I think it was key that I really felt like I started to care about what I was reporting on and care about the people I was covering,” she said. 

 

‘One of the best’

Tony Parks, the play-by-play announcer for the Salt Lake City Bees has known and worked alongside Donaldson for over 10 years, said he recognizes the challenges she's faced and overcome. He believes Donaldson is one of the best reporters he’s ever seen, treating a women’s volleyball player from Sevier County the same way she treated a 10-time, all-star player in the NBA.  

“Amy had no problem paying the taxes, penalties and fees that came with doing the right thing, confronting the wrong things, and doing what it takes to move things in a really positive direction,” he said.

He says Amy has always been quick to correct, quick to redirect, and very strong to stay consistent with her reporting and her treatment with people in her field and in the sports world. He believes she always had an ability to make sure that she jumped in to draw that charging foul anytime, any blatant disrespect, subtle disrespect, or whatever it was. 

Donaldson says she will always be someone to fight for a woman's place in the world. She explains that even though she has had to pick some fights to let herself and other women be heard she has no regrets. 

“I feel like I spent a lot of my time arguing for or making rationalizations for why women should be here,” Donaldson said. “I don't regret any of the fights I picked, and I don't know if it made life better for anybody, but at least I called them out.”

Sarah Weaver, a longtime reporter and editor with the Deseret News worked alongside Donaldson for 28 years and praises her approach to journalism. 

“[She] has personalized the issues of women in sports -- paying equal attention to women and men in her coverage of high school sports in Utah and bringing forward the compelling stories of female athletes,” Weaver said. 

Donaldson said she believes women in sports have always had a hard time being in the spotlight compared to men. 

“Women in sports is on the rise, and so I think you're gonna see more coverage, but we still have very few women in sports compared to men where they don’t have a hard time trying to break in and become equal to the men.”

She says women have had to deal with sexism for a long time whether they play a sport or report on one and still deal with sexism today, but we are going to see more and more opportunities for women in sports. 

“As far as women athletics, it's only going to get bigger and better. There's only more money, there's only more success, and more opportunities.”

She said she always felt supported by women in her field and wants to continue to be someone both women and men can turn to for support and mentorship. She doesn’t think of herself as an advocate, she said, but more of a complainer who wants to see the sports world change to become more equal. 

​​ “I really relate to the women who've had to fight, and I feel bad for them that they didn't just get to be athletes,” she said, “I feel like I’m a little bit of a complainer because I’ve spent a lot of my time arguing for or making rationalizations for why women should be here.”

Currently, Donaldson is working on a podcast that will be released in the fall. The podcast will be about how recruiters lure international students here to play high school sports, and then they just kind of abandon them, and they still take their money, but they don't always deliver what they promise. 

 “Sports does this thing that helps us escape reality but can also be something that brings reality into really sharp focus,” she said. “People can use that platform to bring awareness to a situation that we otherwise wouldn't pay attention to.”