Bill Shipman came to Brandeis in 1981 as the head coach of both men's and women's fencing and has continued the long tradition of fencing excellence at Brandeis. His men's team won the 1989 University Athletic Association championship and finished runner-up six times. His women's team has won four UAA titles, including the three straight from 1993-95, and finished runner-up twice.

Prior to his arrival here, Shipman served as an assistant coach at the University of Pennsylvania from 1978-1981. He has a bachelor of arts in education with a major in Physical Education from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill and a masters degree in Recreation and Parks Administation from Clemson University.

Shipman has been selected seven times as a coach for the United States Olympic Festival, one of only eight selected each year. He served on the NCAA Fencing Committee from 1996-99. The Brandeis coaching staff was named as the UAA Staff of the Year several times.

Shipman was honored as the United States Fencing Coaches Association Coach of the Year in 1994, the first year Brandeis hosted the NCAA Fencing championships and one of his women fencers, Kristin Foellmer, won All-American honors by finishing third in the foil.

In 1999, Shipman served as chair of the NCAA Men's and Women's Fencing Committee as Brandeis served as host school for the second time. One of his fencers, Tim Morehouse earned All-American honors by finishing fourth in the men's sabre that year. Morehouse went on to become the first Brandeisian in University history to qualify for the Olympic Games, traveling to Athens in 2004, where he helped the saber squad to the silver medal.

Shipman is an accredited fencing master, who coaches at the Boston Fencing Club in addition to his duties at Brandeis.

Taro Yamashita, the owner and head coach of the Riverside Fencing Club in Hadley, Mass., enters his second year as assistant coach of the Brandeis men’s and women’s fencing teams. A 1995 graduate of Brown University, Yamashita was the 1994 Northeast Fencing Conference men’s epee champion. He also earned USFA epee titles in the New England Division in 1999 and at the North Atlantic sectional in 2000. In 2001, he was ranked 33rd in the United States and 302nd in the world points standings. Yamashita has also coached at MIT, Brown, Mount Holyoke and UMass-Amherst.