Danielle Lynch traces her competitive nature to childhood, when as a young fan of Olympic Champion sprinter Florence Griffith Joyner, she raced friends down her northern New Jersey neighborhood streets barefoot.
She almost always won.
“That’s when I learned I don’t need anything but who I am to be successful,” she says.
Lynch used that outlook to become a first-generation student-athlete at Rutgers University, and it’s the same perspective she’s brought to Pomona-Pitzer as Director of Athletics and chair of the Physical Education Department.
“Athletics can be a vehicle to help people gain access to a better life,” she says. “In my leadership, I try and make sure we’re eliminating barriers and allowing students from all walks of life to make the connections they need to be successful—in the classroom, the community, their fields of play and socially.”
Lynch started her new role in April, just in time to join the Sagehens women’s water polo team for a celebratory jump in the pool after it captured a fifth straight USA Water Polo Division III championship.
Such excellence is what Lynch says she hopes to elevate as athletic director, a personal charge she says alumni, donors and the greater Pomona community have embraced and already helped set in motion.
“I felt the love immediately,” she says. “I felt supported. People are asking the right questions and then truly listening for the answers to the solutions they’re seeking. People are truly wanting to engage in meaningful ways to learn about my experiences and how I’m going to work with our students.”
Ahead of her first full academic and athletic year at Pomona College, Lynch recently answered questions about the Sagehen community, philanthropy, holistic development and wellness, and the hallmarks of great athletic departments.
Responses have been edited for length and clarity.
What traits do great athletic departments have in common?
Great athletic departments have core values that are strong. They’re student centered. They have coaches that are teaching and building culture. Winning helps people feel good, but great athletic departments have a healthy, successful culture that develops young people holistically. A byproduct of that, oftentimes, is winning, and not only winning in the sport, but also winning in life.
I’ve been at a lot of places that do things really, really well, and I’ve gained different tidbits of excellence from those spaces to work into my own ethos and core values on how I’d like my department to be run.
How do you hope to strengthen connections between student-athletes, alumni and the broader Pomona community?
College is full of incredible opportunities, but it’s also a time when students face real challenges—academically, socially and personally.
When alumni and families stay engaged, they help create a network of people who care deeply about student success and well-being. I think one of the most powerful things we can do is create opportunities for just that by bringing people together around the things that matter most—supporting student wellness, celebrating their achievements on and off the field and ensuring they have what they need to thrive.
Alumni and families can play such a meaningful role in both celebrating those successes, while also helping address the obstacles students face along the way.
What role do alumni and families play in the success of an athletics program, and how can they stay meaningfully connected to today’s programs and student experiences?
Alumni show our current student-athletes what a Sagehen life looks like after they’ve left the bubble of collegiate athletics with an excellent liberal arts education. They help us with mentorship as well as career networks, and they model what our current student-athletes and students in general hope to become. Families are partners in the developmental mission. We recruit families, not just athletes.
We are also incredibly grateful for the many alumni and families whose generosity strengthen Sagehen Athletics. Their support helps create opportunities for student-athletes to pursue excellence while benefiting from the full Pomona experience—from competitive athletics and leadership development to academic achievement and personal growth.
That spirit of support is reflected in Sagehen Athletics Giving Day, where alumni and families have consistently rallied behind our athletes, supporting everything from team travel to facility upgrades. Their generosity is a powerful expression of the lifelong connection so many have to Pomona and its athletic community.
Where can community support make an immediate impact?
Sagehen Athletics creates a powerful entry point for Pomona alumni, families and friends to invest in student success. Their involvement—whether through mentorship, volunteerism or cheering in the stands—supports an experience that helps our Pomona-Pitzer student-athletes develop as leaders and scholars. Donor support in particular strengthens wellness, expands career development opportunities and helps ensure that every student has the resources needed to learn, grow and thrive.
I also encourage Sagehens to reach out to me directly so I can hear what is needed, and what concerns and questions we all have. We need to have honest and open conversations about opportunities to create community, excellence and holistic development.
What responsibility do athletics departments have in shaping good citizens and leaders?
Some of my doctoral research looked at social justice and leadership. Student-athletes have social capital, especially on liberal arts campuses that lack fraternity and sorority life. We want to help develop our student-athletes to become conscientious leaders who are bringing solutions to some of the larger issues we’re facing—not only as a country but worldwide.
Student-athletes have the power to shift culture and to make change on a large scale, so it’s our responsibility to help them understand the power they hold and activate it for good.