University of Wisconsin-Stout Athletics

Over the course of a 39 year association with UW-Stout, Rita (McKinley) Slinden likes to say she had at least nine different careers without ever having to leave what is now the Sports & Fitness Center.

During her 30-plus years at Stout, Slinden was a coach, an instructor and an administrator for the athletic and physical education departments. Slinden was the women’s head swimming and diving coach (nine years), the women’s head track and field coach (six years), the women’s head basketball coach (one year), an assistant men’s and women’s cross country coach (five years) and an assistant men’s and women’s track and field coach where she worked with the throwing events (six years).

In addition, she was also the Athletic Director/Physical Education Department chair (two years), served two stints as the interim physical education chair/co-director of athletics, was the associate administrator (five years), director of intramurals (three years) and taught classes in the physical education department with a primary emphasis on aquatics, fitness activities and lifetime sports.

Slinden came to UW-Stout in 1971, a time when women’s athletics was expanding not only at Stout, but across the entire country.

“I was involved in women’s athletics during a time of growth and development from the early 1970s when we were simply thrilled to have women’s sports,” Slinden said. “I have seen women’s sports grow to where they are an accepted and thriving part of Stout’s athletic programs.”

Slinden played parts in seeing the Wisconsin Women’s Intercollegiate Athletic Conference (WWIAC), a predecessor of the current Wisconsin Intercollegiate Athletic Conference (WIAC), grow to become one of the strongest athletic conferences in the country. The WWIAC celebrated 25 years before it merged with the WIAC during the late 1990s.

Slinden was awarded a WWIAC Distinguished Service Award and several times served as the sports chair for swimming and track and field. Slinden is especially proud of her athlete’s accomplishments.

“I had the honor of coaching numerous athletes in national competition,” Slinden said. Three of Slinden’s former athletes are enshrined in the UW-Stout Hall of Fame, including the first women’s inductee, Charlotte Fritsche. Slinden helped to coach four All-American athletes and one national champion, Sean Larson who won the 2010 national outdoor discus title in Slinden’s final year of coaching.

As an administrator, Slinden either oversaw or assisted in the oversight of the entire athletic, physical education and health academic programs. She also worked extensively with the planning and progress of a $4.5 million project that added an indoor track and multi-purpose facility to the Sports & Fitness Center.

Slinden retired fulltime from the University in 2004, but returned as an assistant track and field coach. Slinden’s daughter, Diane, was also a Stout assistant track coach, and both worked with the throwers, making them one of the few mother-daughter coaching tandems at any college level.

“I will always remember the close family atmosphere that is present at UW-Stout,” Slinden said. “Being part of Blue Devil athletics was like belonging to a special family. Athletes, coaches, and parents care about each other and take care of each other, win or lose.

“From my first years coaching women’s swimming & diving and women’s track & field, through my “historic” year of coaching women’s basketball, through my years working in administration, to my final years of coaching the men and women in the throwing events on the track & field teams I have always felt that UW-Stout Athletics had a family atmosphere where we worked hard, played hard, and cared hard.”

Slinden is married to Howard Slinden and the couple have two adult children, Diane and Mark. Diane, and her husband, David Schofield, have a daughter, Kate.