Owner, Fry Sports Performance, LLC
Professor Emerita, University of Kansas
Mary Fry is a Professor Emerita in the Department of Educational Psychology at the University of Kansas. She was the Director of the KU Sport and Exercise Psychology Lab and oversaw the graduate program in the area. Mary started her career as a high school tennis coach and physical education teacher in Texas. She recognized how challenging it is for coaches and teachers to bring out the best in each athlete and student, and after four years she decided to pursue graduate study in sport psychology to learn more about motivation in sport. She has spent the years since studying this topic, and has become convinced that the key to helping athletes maximize their experience and performance is linked to coaches fostering a positive and caring team environment that help athletes gauge success based on their personal effort and improvement, and cooperation with teammates.
Mary and her colleagues authored A Coach’s Guide to Maximizing the Youth Sport Experience: Work Hard and Be Kind with Routledge in 2020. Mary is a National Advisory Board member for the Positive Coaching Alliance, and served on the executive board of the Association of Applied Sport Psychology. She has served on the Editorial Board for the Journal of Sport, Exercise, and Performance Psychology; the Journal of Applied Sport Psychology, and the Journal of Sport Psychology in Action.
Since retiring, Mary continues her research and collaborations through her consulting firm, Fry Sports Performance, LLC. She and her husband, Andy, live in Lawrence, KS with a host of pets. They enjoy watching their son, Jared, and daughter, Lindsey, follow their passions.