As turmoil hit the Iowa football program last month, Felicia Goodson’s first reaction was that of a mother and then it quickly turned to potentially becoming someone who could leave a lasting mark on college athletics.

Goodson is active on social media, so when the world of Hawkeye football started to hit a pretty significant bump in the road on a Friday night in June as former players aired their issues of racial disparity within the program she immediately took notice.

“For us our first concern was Tyler and we wanted to have a conversation with him. We wanted to know if he experienced any of those things. We talked about it and he assured us he never had those experiences,” she said.

Her son is Tyler Goodson, who happened to be Iowa’s leading rusher last season as a true freshman. The Georgia native ended the season on a high note with 116 years rushing against Nebraska and scoring a touchdown in Iowa’s victory over USC in the Holiday Bowl.

The accusations were primarily towards strength and conditioning coach Chris Doyle, who was placed on leave shortly after the claims were made and then eventually entered into a separation agreement with the University of Iowa.

Feeling good about her son’s experience and his future in the Iowa program, Goodson quickly pivoted towards creating a program that could make a difference for minority athletes, appropriately calling it the Minority Athlete Coalition.

“I was just watching all this thinking that there was something positive that could come from this, so I started talking to people about it and trying to figure out the best way to make a difference.”

Goodson said she had a private conversation with James Daniels, who was one of the most outspoken former Iowa players. She felt that Daniels intentions were pure and he simply wanted to see Iowa do better when it came to black football players and athletes.

“He wanted to see change in the program and he wanted it to be better. He felt it was an important conversation and his heart was in the right place to make Iowa better.”

From there the Minority Athlete Coalition started to come together.

Goodson said with the help of Randy Saunders, a lawyer from the firm of Nelson and Mullins, they have filed articles of incorporation and are in the process of receiving a 501c3 designation as a nonprofit organization.

“Randy has been so helpful,” Goodson said. “He’s a huge Iowa fan and he reached out and their firm is doing all the work to help us get set up pro bono.”

The goal for Goodson is to eventually set up a Minority Athlete Coalition representative on every campus. Logically, she is looking to start the process at Iowa, where he son Tyler plays college football and also at Mercer, where her son Taylor is a playing as a freshman this fall.

“I want to see this as sort of a Fellowship of Christian Athletes type group, where there’s a presence on every college campus. It would be free and there could be a tier membership,” she said. “We would like to send out surveys to athletes on campus and get their feedback and then provide them with workshops and also have a place for them to talk with a representative that can help them if they have a problem.”

To learn more about the Minority Athlete Coalition, please go to their website: https://minorityathletecoalition.org/

You can also follow their work on social media @AthleteMinority on Twitter.