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Gallaudet University

OFFICIAL ATHLETICS SITE OF THE GALLAUDET UNIVERSITY BISON
GALLAUDET UNIVERSITY BISON
Sam Atkinson

Sam Atkinson

  • Title
    Associate Athletic Director for Communications
  • Phone
    202.448.7081
  • Phone 2
    202.423.0642
  • Email
    sam.atkinson@gallaudet.edu
  • Previous College
    Salisbury '00
  • Master's Degree
    Georgetown '13
  • Year at Gallaudet
    16th

Atkinson enters his 16th year at Gallaudet University, the world's only university in which all programs and services are specifically designed to accommodate deaf and hard of hearing students, during the 2025-26 school year.

In April 2017, he was promoted to Associate Athletic Director for Communications after four years as Assistant Athletic Director for Communications.

Atkinson has led the charge of placing Gallaudet Athletics on the map thanks to expanded national and international media coverage of Bison sports since he arrived. His media savviness has helped to land Bison athletics on the front cover of national newspapers, magazines to being featured on network television and local media outlets including top sport websites online.

He handles the media and public relation duties for all 17 varsity sports at Gallaudet and oversees the game management and operations for Bison athletics. In 2022, he led the department in a website redesign and transfer to SIDEARM Sports and the launch of www.GallaudetBison.com. He also manages GU athletics' social media platforms including Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, Snapchat, and online video through YouTube, BoxCast.

Under Atkinson’s leadership, the Gallaudet Athletic social media platforms were ranked No. 1 by a Division III social media tracking website for four consecutive years (2014-18) for its posts and engagement, and @GallaudetBison remains one of the top brands in Division III due to its social media activity. 
Several national coaches associations have honored Atkinson for his outstanding media relations and social media skills for promoting Gallaudet Athletics over the years.

Under Atkinson, Gallaudet has increased its College Sports Communicators Academic All-America awards over ninefold from two to 19.

Atkinson took Gallaudet’s athletic media relations to a new level in the fall of 2013 when the Bison football team started the season 9-0 and won its first Eastern Collegiate Football Conference (ECFC) championship. The Bison football team went onto the NCAA tournament for the first time in school history. In the process, there were over 60 national stories written, broadcasted or posted online about the Bison football team in one month. Gallaudet was featured on CBS Evening News, ESPN and its blocked field goal returned for a touchdown was one of ESPN SportsCenter’s Top 10 Plays to name a few highlights. The media blitz included 60 stories, 16,000 words written, an hour and a half of video broadcasted locally and national on TV, 30 minutes of radio coverage locally and nationally and over a million dollars worth of free publicity for the University. He helped to land Adham Talaat on the Gagliardi Finalist list, awarded to the top Division III football player, and helped his NFL prospects during the spring of 2014.

In June 2013, he was promoted to Assistant Athletic Director for Communications after serving as Sports Information Director for the previous four years.

In 2011-12, the Gallaudet Sports Information Office went green and debuted Quick Response (QR) Code Gameday programs to encourage fans to use their mobile devices (phones or tablets) to scan a QR code to get the game program instead of making copies on paper. The move received national attention from the Sports Information industry and was marveled as a great step to go green and use new technology. Under Atkinson’s leadership live video streaming debuted to go with the current live stats feature for home games. The office also did CoverItLive chats with some of the head coaches, to give the public an opportunity to interact and talk with Gallaudet’s coaches about their respective teams.

During the 2010-11 season Atkinson orchestrated unprecedented media coverage for Gallaudet athletics. The Bison football team had a miraculous interception video go viral on YouTube, over a million hits in two days, and was featured on the front page of Yahoo.com, Yahoo’s College Football section, it later made ESPN’s Top 10 Plays of the Day (at No. 2 on Thursday, Sept. 30) and later made ESPN College Gameday’s Plays of the Year video for college football shown on New Year’s Day. That was just the beginning for helping to place Gallaudet on the national stage. The Bison women’s basketball team started the season 20-0 and garnered national media coverage of its own as the Bison were covered by the Associated Press, Washington Post, Parade Magazine, Sports Illustrated, National Public Radio, ABC News, CBS Evening News, ESPN College Gameday, Inside Higher Education, D3hoops.com, Comcast Sportsnet, NBC 4 and Fox 5. The team went onto the NCAA tournament for the first-time in a decade. Later in the spring, the baseball team was profiled in ESPN The Magazine and This Week in Baseball.

In his first year, he made an immediate impact on the national and regional exposure for Gallaudet athletics as the Bison were featured on the front cover of USA Today, Washington Post, ESPN.com along with numerous hometown newspapers across the country. Gallaudet was also featured on Comcast Sportsnet a regional cable television sports network. Atkinson also met President Barack Obama, First Lady Michelle Obama and Vice-President Joe Biden as Gallaudet student-athletes and coaches were invited to the White House, Title IX special announcement and Coach Curtis Pride's appointment to the President's Council for Fitness, Sports and Nutrition.

Atkinson is also heavily involved on the national level with College Sports Communicators (formerly known as College Sports Information Directors of America. Atkinson was appointed to the CSC Board of Directors in June 2015 for a three-year term. After two years on the board he was elected as CSC's Third Vice President in June 2017. He became the organization's President in 2020-21 becoming only the second Division III member to become President in the 65-year history of CSC/CoSIDA.

During Atkinson's time on the CSC Board he has contributed by serving on the CSC Convention Programming Committee, CSC Appreciation Week Committee, CSC Diversity and Inclusion Committee, CSC's Academic All-America Hall of Fame Selection Committee, CSC Academic All-America voter, served as the board liaison with the Goodwill and Wellness Committee, Programming Committee and AAA Hall of Fame Selection Committee and has served as a mentor to other SIDs. Atkinson has been a panelist and moderator several times at the CSC Convention. For three years he served on the NCAA Division III Day Planning Committee (2014-17).

Atkinson was the chair of the CSC Goodwill and Wellness Committee for eight years and still is an active member on that committee. Atkinson and his committee members established and orchestrated six national community service projects in San Antonio (2009) with the San Antonio Food Bank, in San Francisco (2010) with the St. Anthony Foundation, in St. Louis (2012) with the St. Patrick Center, and in Orlando (2013, ’14, ’15) with the Coalition for the Homeless of Central Florida.

In 2011, he helped to organize CSC's first-ever 5K run/walk at Marco Island, Fla., where nearly 100 people participated and over $1,600 and hundreds of clothing items were donated to St. Matthew's House in Naples, Fla. The 5K run/walk returned in 2012 in St. Louis where over $1,000 was raised thanks to 100 plus runners who participated in the run/walk under the Gateway Arch. The 2013 5K run/walk was held at Hawks Landing Golf Course on the property of the Orlando World Center Marriott as over $1,000 was raised to benefit the Coalition for the Homeless. The race returned to Hawks Landing Golf Course in 2014 and merged with National Association of Collegiate Directors of Athletics (NACDA) and Affiliates as ninety runners helped to raise $1,100 for Coalition for the Homeless. A record 153 participants helped to raise $1,565 for the Coalition for the Homeless in 2015.

Atkinson along with members of the Goodwill and Wellness Committee debuted the Volunteer15 program in the summer of 2014. The new program was designed to promote more philanthropy among CSC members and to recognize the great volunteer work Sports Information Directors (SIDs) perform in their own communities and campuses.

In 2014, Atkinson was presented the Bob Kenworthy Community Service Award by CSC and in 2020 he was named the Mary Jo Trailblazer Award recipient. In June 2023, Atkinson will receive the Warren Berg Award, presented annually to a college division member who has made outstanding contributions to the field of college athletics communications, and who by their activities, has brought dignity and prestige to the profession.

In July 2016, Atkinson was named to the NCAA Division III Men's Basketball National Committee where he served a four-year term. In the summer of 2018, Atkinson was elected by his peers on the committee to be the chair for the 2018-19 season. Atkinson got re-elected to the chair position for the 2019-20 season and is one of the first multi-year chairman in the history of the NCAA Division III Men's Basketball National Committee. He helped to oversee the 2020 NCAA Division III men's basketball national championship, which was slated to be a joint championship with NCAA Division I and II in Atlanta on April 4-6 before it got canceled due to the COVID-19 pandemic. 

Atkinson is currently serving a four-year term (2021-25) on the NCAA Division III women's volleyball national committee. He was voted by his committee peers as the chair for the 2023 and 2024 seasons, another first for a Sports Information Director on this committee.

Atkinson earned his master's degree in Sports Industry Management from Georgetown University in 2013 and his B.A. in communication arts from Salisbury University in 2000.

Atkinson arrived at Gallaudet on July 6, 2009, from Capital Athletic Conference (CAC) foe Salisbury University where he served in the same position for three years. While at Salisbury, Atkinson covered and promoted Salisbury's 21 varsity sports that captured 28 CAC championships in three years. He promoted SU's two-time defending NCAA Division III men's lacrosse national champions (2007, '08) along with two women's lacrosse national finalist teams (2007, '09) and a national semifinalist field hockey team (2007). During his tenure at SU he covered 394 All-CAC honorees, 69 All-Americans and 38 All-Atlantic Central Football Conference selections. He also had the pleasure to promote Salisbury women's lacrosse standout Sue Ackermann who was named a finalist for the 2008 NCAA Woman of the Year award. Salisbury captured three consecutive CAC All-Sports Awards and won the first two CAC Men's and Women's Commissioner Awards. Atkinson hosted nearly 50 NCAA tournament games in three years as SU served as a regional host seven times in five different sports. In 2009, SU hosted baseball, softball and women's lacrosse regionals (30 games) in 10 days. The Sea Gull softball team advanced to the NCAA Softball Championship round and women's lacrosse advanced to the title game. Atkinson has also had the pleasure to cover two ECAC Bowl Championship football teams in three seasons. One of Atkinson's biggest accomplishments at SU was redesigning the athletic web site as he worked with PrestoSports to debut www.suseagulls.com in January 2008. He also used PrestoSports' Live Stats applications to run in-game statistics for hundreds of home SU games in two seasons.

Atkinson earned several national awards while at Salisbury University including the 2009 American Volleyball Coaches Association (AVCA) Grant Burger Media Award as the top Sports Information Director the Mid-Atlantic Region for Division III. In 2008, he was named the PrestoSports Sixth Man Award honoree, which recognizes a client who made significant contributions to the product or company. CoSIDA has also recognized him in its annual publications contests where he received first-place honors for the best cover in the Division C Postseason Guides category in 2008-09. The year before he took home first-place accolades in the Division B-C, District 2, Spring Sports Poster category. In 2007, the Phoenix, Md., native was named the Inside Lacrosse Division III Women's Lacrosse Media Service Award recipient.

Atkinson served as the assignment manager at WBOC-TV out of college before moving to Baltimore to work at Inside Lacrosse magazine as its web content manager for www.insidelacrosse.com. Atkinson went back to television in 2003 where he served as head sports producer for Sinclair Broadcast Group, a national news organization based in Cockeysville, Md. He later returned to the lacrosse world and served as the web content manager at US Lacrosse, the national governing body of lacrosse, for www.uslacrosse.org and www.laxmagazine.com. Over the years he has been a freelance sports writer for The Baltimore Sun and The Salisbury Daily Times. Atkinson served a semester internship with CNN in Atlanta the fall of 1999. He is also a proud Eagle Scout in the Boy Scouts of America as he worked three summers at Philmont Scout Ranch in Cimarron, N.M.

Atkinson and his wife, Emily, have two children.

ATKINSON IN THE NEWS