“Just because the door is now open, that doesn’t mean that I can relax.”
The first time Maia Chaka fell in love with football, she wasn’t even sure what the sport was. As a child, she loved to go outside and toss a football around with her younger brother. This eventually led to her playing football with the boys in her neighborhood and grew to a full-fledged passion for the game in her teens. But when Chaka couldn’t find a tackle football team in high school that would accept girls, she switched to other sports. It wasn’t until her college years at Norfolk State University that she rediscovered her love for the game in a new way: officiating. Armed with a bachelor’s in education, Chaka took a major leap and started two careers at once: a physical education teacher and a football referee. It did more than just pay off. On Friday, Chaka became the NFL’s newest official, making her the first Black woman ever named to the league’s officiating staff. Chaka has spent her career officiating major collegiate events, including roles at both the Pac-12 Conference and Conference USA. She has been a part of the NFL’s Officiating Development Program since 2014, which takes officials at the college level and gives them experience and exposure at the NFL level, something she says took her to the big leagues.
