At those moments when he is home alone with a crying 5-month-old son, a 2-year-old daughter begging for playtime, and two dogs barking at the mailman, Jim Sias wonders how his wife juggles the chaos and coaching the Rutgers women’s lacrosse team.
“My first instinct is to call and see if the grandparents want to spend some time with the kids to help me out,” Sias said. “Flip that coin and when I’m traveling on business, she is seemingly seamlessly able to handle all of the parenting in addition to her coaching responsibilities.”
Laura Brand-Sias is a working mother in the time-demanding and highly scrutinized world of Division I college coaching, where only 41 percent of women’s teams in the seven biggest conferences are coached by females, according to leading research at the Tucker Center.