Raleigh resident and Southern Tennis Hall of Fame inductee Paula Hale received the 2024 United States Tennis Association Champions of Equality honor at the US Open earlier this month for her efforts in fostering equity and growth in tennis.
The Champions of Equality Award celebrates women who have led the fight for equality in sports and entertainment, and a member from each of the USTA’s 16 sections received the honor for their contributions to the game on the grassroots level. Hale represented the Southern section, and she shared the honor alongside television creator and producer Shonda Rhimes, who received the second annual Billie Jean King Champions of Equality Award.
“I’ve had a lot of honors in tennis, but I think that one is probably one of the best ones I’ve ever received,” Rhimes said. “It recognizes what women are trying to achieve in the world of tennis and volunteering, particularly.”
In Hale’s decades-long career in volunteering and serving in USTA leadership roles, her mission has been to make the game accessible to everyone in the state of North Carolina and the United States.
A native of Scotland Neck, a small town in eastern North Carolina, Hale wasn’t exposed to tennis until taking a physical education class at East Carolina University.
“When I say I grew up in a tennis desert, I mean literally, it was because there were no opportunities,” Hale said.
Originally a golfer, Hale picked up tennis as an adult as it didn’t take hours like a round of golf and better fit her life with the responsibilities of a job.
“I was an adult learner and a self-taught player, but I really found the passion for it,” Hale said.
Her passion eventually turned into a lifestyle that went beyond the tennis court. Hale eventually got involved with the behind-the-scenes of the tennis world and found a tennis “family”, or a core of volunteers, that would meet and talk about different ways to grow the game, build facilities and spread knowledge about tennis.
“We formed these local community organizations called CTAs, which are community tennis associations,” Hale said. “Basically, they’re almost always volunteer led groups that focus on growing tennis in a geographic area.”
Hale helped start the Downeast Community Tennis Association in Pitt County, which is one of the 28 CTAs under UTSA North Carolina.
“So, you’ll get together a group of volunteers and they say, ‘Ok, what do we need to do to organize tennis in our town?’” Hale said. “They’re the ones that will advocate their city for courts, places to play and public access. People think tennis is an expensive sport, and it can be if you get into the world of private lessons and go a route of where it costs more, but it doesn’t have to be. Most public tennis facilities are free to play in or very nominal cost to use the facilities. We have CTAs that will give you a racket.”
One of the biggest drivers of Hale’s passion for making tennis accessible to everyone is the health benefits.
According to the UTSA, participation in racquet sports, including tennis, reduces risk of all-cause mortality by 47% and cardiovascular-related death by 56%. The UTSA also reported that tennis players on average lived an additional 9.7 years than sedentary individuals.
“I say to parents, introduce your children to all sports and let them decide, but just keep in mind that when they’re 40 or 50 years old, they’re not going to be kicking the soccer ball around, and they’re not going to be on the softball field or baseball field playing ball,” Hale said. “But they can be on the tennis court.”
Said Hale, “We have people at our club that are in their 90s and are national champions in tennis. So, it just shows you that whether you being at 5 or you’re 95, there’s a place in tennis for everybody.”
Hale served as the president of USTA North Carolina from 2000-03 and the president of the North Carolina Tennis Foundation in 2004-06. Her efforts at the local level reached an even larger scale when she became the president of USTA Southern from 2015-16 and the president of Southern Tennis Foundation from 2017-18.
Currently, Hale is a USTA Chair of the Advisory Group on Committees, serving as an advisor to the USTA president.
“Now, my focus is more of a national level, and at that level, we want to make sure what we’re doing at that level has a direct impact back down in communities” Hale said. “The work that’s being done by national committees is of value to helping volunteers all the way down the line.”
