President Anita's outlook for this Rotary Year

Anita Barker is in her 21st year as the Executive Director of Athletics for Chico State’s 13 intercollegiate athletics programs and has been a member of Chico Noon Rotary since 2005.

 Despite losing the entire 2020–21 season due to the COVID-19 pandemic, Barker succeeded in keeping the athletic department intact and reinforcing the department-wide concept of “Wildcat Family,” resulting in another successful year in 2021–22. Twelve of Chico State’s 13 NCAA-sanctioned sports programs reached postseason play, culminating with Chico State winning the CCAA Hiegert Commissioner’s Cup—awarded to the conference institution with the best overall athletics performance in a given academic year—for the sixth time in the last 10 years.

Barker’s efforts have resulted in several well-deserved individual honors, including National Association of Collegiate Directors of Athletics (NACDA) Division II West Region Athletic Director of the Year awards in 2009 and again in 2019.

Anita has worked in the Chico State athletic department since 1990, when she was hired as an assistant athletic trainer. She began working in athletic administration in 1995, when she was appointed the assistant athletic director and senior woman administrator. In 1997, she was promoted to associate athletic director.

Anita graduated from Ohio Northern University in 1985 and received her master’s degree from the University of Arizona in Tucson in 1987. She has worked at all three divisions in the NCAA.

Anita and her husband Scott, the Wildcats’ head athletic trainer, have two children, Luke and McKena—both former Chico State athletes