SportsLetter

SL Interview: Elizabeth Kristen fights for gender equity in sports

Last year marked the 40th anniversary of the passage of Title IX of the Educational Amendment of 1972, the groundbreaking law that prohibits gender discrimination in federally funded educational programs.  That includes athletic programs, of course, and Title IX is credited with helping to level the playing field for female athletes in the high school and collegiate ranks.

The occasion of the anniversary prompted many journalists to write that Title IX has been a resounding success.  These commentators often cited the substantial growth in female participation in athletics as proof.  For example, they noted that scholarships for women participating in intercollegiate athletics did not exist in 1972; today, over 190,000 women play college sports.

Participation numbers are only one measurement of gender equity, however, and critics of Title IX are quick to point out that the disparities that existed before 1972 have not been completely eradicated.  The boys' football team gets a state-of-the-art scoreboard and new uniforms, while the girls' softball team must be satisfied with using a baseball field. As the National Women's Law Center recently concluded, "Despite the fact that Title IX has opened many doors for women and girls in athletics, schools across the country are still not providing equal opportunities for girls to participate in sports and are not treating girls’ teams equally in terms of benefits and resources."

One organization that continues to monitor the efficacy of Title IX is Fair Play for Girls in Sports.  Fair Play is a project within the offices of The Legal Aid Society-Employment Law Center (LAS-ELC) in San Francisco.  Fair Play has focused its efforts on securing equality for girls at the elementary, middle and high school levels.  In addition, it has brought attention to AB 2404, a little-publicized law in California that calls for equal access to athletic opportunities at the local parks and recreation departments.  This issue is particularly important in low-income communities, which are often more dependent on park and rec programs and facilities and which often show a large disparity in athletic participation between girls and boys.

Elizabeth Kristen is the director of the Gender Equity & LGBT Rights Program and a senior staff attorney at the LAS-ELC.  Kristen graduated from University of California, Berkeley, Law School in 2001.  She spent a year clerking for James Browning on the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals in San Francisco.  She first came to LAS-ELC in 2002 on a fellowship from the Skadden Foundation, described as "the legal Peace Corps," because it allows recent law school graduates to pursue public interest law.  In 2003, she helped start the Fair Play program (originally known as the Title IX K-12 Equality Project).
 
SportsLetter spoke with Kristen about Title IX, AB 2404, and gender equity in sports by phone from her office in San Francisco.

--David Davis

Louisville hoops star featured in SportsLetter Interview

Louisville's huge upset of Baylor yesterday in the NCAA Women's hoop tourney was led by Shoni Schimmel, the star of "Off the Rez." Re-read our 2011 interview with director Jonathan Hock.

SL Interview: Keith O'Brien's year in Kentucky high school basketball

The season-in-the-life genre has yielded several classic tales about youth sports: Buzz Bissinger's "Friday Night Lights," Madeleine Blais' "In These Girls, Hope Is a Muscle," John Feinstein's "A Season on the Brink."  These writers immersed themselves in the culture of the teams they were following and, perhaps more importantly, in the communities that obsessively supported these teams.  What they discovered was simultaneously triumphant and troubling.

In "Outside Shot: Big Dreams, Hard Times, and One County's Quest for Basketball Greatness" (St. Martin's Press), journalist Keith O'Brien journeyed to rural Kentucky to follow the fortunes of the boys basketball team of Scott County High School during the 2009-10 season.  Like Bissinger, Blais and Feinstein before him, O'Brien immersed himself in a culture and a community that to outsiders might seem totally alien.  The result is equally triumphant and troubling.

Wrote reviewer Bill Littlefield in the Boston Globe: "'Outside Shot' is being compared to the spectacularly successful 'Friday Night Lights'. . . . The comparison is legitimate in that both books are about young athletes celebrated in their communities who see sports as a path to a new life, and both communities are made up of the quietly desperate who get more excited about high school sports than they do about anything else."

A former reporter with the New Orleans Times-Picayune, O'Brien left his staff job at the Boston Globe to research and write "Outside Shot."  SportsLetter interviewed him by phone from his home in New Orleans.

--David Davis

SL Interview: Teacher, coach Stuart Krohn talks about inner-city rugby

Rugby is among the fastest growing youth sports in the country.  And, while the total number of youth playing rugby remains modest when compared to soccer, football, volleyball, basketball, baseball and softball, the sport is poised to receive a huge boost in 2016, when the sport returns to the Olympic Games for the first time since 1924.  The United States won the gold medal, defeating France, 17-3.

Since 2003, former professional player Stuart Krohn has spearheaded an effort to promote youth rugby in South Los Angeles.  An English teacher with the Inner City Education Foundation (ICEF) charter group, Krohn has organized boys and girls teams among students who attend ICEF's 14 schools.  Approximately 80 percent of ICEF's 4,200 students are African-American.  Richard Riordan, the former mayor of Los Angeles, is the chairman of the board of ICEF.

A major component of ICEF's rugby program involves taking students abroad to compete in rugby hotbeds like South Africa and Hong Kong.  Earlier this year, Krohn led boys and girls rugby teams to New Zealand to play youth squads in that rugby-mad country.  Director James Brown filmed the tour and interviewed the players about living in South Los Angeles and playing a "new" sport.  His feature documentary, titled "Red, White, Black & Blue," shows how sport can impact youth and connect cultures separated by thousands of miles.

"SportsLetter" recently interviewed Stuart Krohn, an executive producer of the film, about the ICEF rugby program, the new documentary, and rugby at the 2016 Olympic Games.
--David Davis

SL Interview: Dr. Robert Cantu speaks out about concussions in youth sports

Dr. Robert Cantu is one of the world's foremost authorities on concussions and brain trauma in sports, with a lengthy resume.  He earned his undergraduate degree at the University of California, Berkeley, where he pitched on the baseball team, and then his medical degree at the University of California Medical School in San Francisco.  Currently, he is the chief of neurosurgery as well as the director of the Service of Sports Medicine at Emerson Hospital in Concord, Mass.  He is the co-director of the Center for the Study of Traumatic Encephalopathy at Boston University, which is investigating the link between concussions and progressive brain disease.  He consults with numerous NFL, NHL, and NBA teams.

Along with journalist Mark Hyman, Dr. Cantu has authored a new book titled "Concussions and Our Kids: America's Leading Expert on How to Protect Young Athletes and Keep Sports Safe" (Houghton Mifflin Harcourt).  The book defines what a concussion is, examines the causes and symptoms of concussions among youth athletes, explains why complete cognitive and physical rest is the best therapy for post-concussion syndrome, and provides easy-to-follow guidelines for parents and coaches to use in protecting their youth athletes.

Part polemic and part prescription, the book discusses the dangers in contact and non-contact youth sports, including soccer, ice hockey, lacrosse, volleyball, wrestling, boxing, mixed martial arts, basketball, baseball and softball, tennis, skateboarding and cheerleading.  Perhaps not surprisingly, the authors identify football at the youth level as "the greatest challenge by far.  Children are among the most vulnerable to injury because they have weak necks and immature musculature, and their brains are still developing.  And youth football by far accounts for the largest number of players -- almost three million from ages six to fourteen, according to USA Football." 

SportsLetter recently spoke with Dr. Cantu over the phone from his office.

--David Davis

SL Interview: Chris Gavagan's documentary on sexual abuse in youth sports

In November of 2011, a grand jury in Pennsylvania indicted former Penn State assistant coach Jerry Sandusky on charges that he had sexually abused young boys from his Second Mile foundation for at-risk youth.  The lurid accusations made front-page headlines and shocked the entire nation.  All except for one group: past victims of such abuse.

As a teen, Chris Gavagan was an aspiring hockey player who was looking forward to trying out for his high school team in New York City.  But from the moment his youth coach targeted him at age 14, Gavagan said, his life was changed forever.  He told nobody what had happened and, instead, became an angry "time-bomb" unleashed into the world.

After high school, Gavagan studied film while attending New York University.  In November of 2009, or about two years before the charges involving Jerry Sandusky were revealed publicly, Gavagan began shooting a documentary film about sexual abuse involving male coaches and male youth athletes.

The film, titled "Coached into Silence," includes interviews with anonymous athletes, with professional hockey player Sheldon Kennedy, and with his former coach.  It is a work-in-progress that Gavagan hopes to have completed by the end of this summer.

SportsLetter spoke to Gavagan by phone from his home in Brooklyn, where he and his wife recently celebrated the birth of their first child.

--David Davis

Editor's Note: This interview contains language of a graphic nature. 

SL Interview: Filmmaker Fred Golding's wrestling documentary "On the Mat"

In the state of Washington the wrestling program at Lake Stevens High School has developed into a storied powerhouse.  The Vikings have won multiple state titles since Coach Brent Barnes, himself the son of a high school wrestling coach, took over the program in the late 1980s, including an 18-year undefeated skein in conference matches.

During the 2010-11 season, documentary filmmaker Fred Golding followed Barnes and the team as Lake Stevens pursued yet another state title.  "On the Mat" focuses on Barnes' efforts to mold his youngsters into winners and shows the sacrifices that the teenagers make during the season.  Many starve themselves to "make weight," while the sport's physical demands are "somewhere in between torture and pure hell," according to Chris Pratt, the film's narrator and executive producer.  Meanwhile, even as wrestling attracts more women grapplers, college scholarships remain a rarity.

New York City-based Golding has been writing, directing and producing documentaries for 25 years.  He often partners with director-producer Mike Tollin on sports-related projects, including "Hardwood Dreams: Ten Years Later," about the ill-fated Morningside High School (Inglewood, Calif.) basketball team that featured Stais Boseman; "Hank Aaron: Chasing the Dream," which earned the pair an Academy Award nomination for Best Feature Documentary; "Bonds on Bonds," ESPN's reality show about Barry Bonds; and, most recently, "On the Mat."

A truncated version of "On the Mat" originally appeared on MTV's "True Life Presents" series in early 2012.  The feature-length version of "On the Mat" just made its world premiere at the 2012 Tribeca/ESPN Sports Film Festival.

SportsLetter spoke to Golding by phone from New York City in early April, just before "On the Mat" debuted at the Tribeca Film Festival.

--David Davis

SL Interview: Author Mark Hyman on the commercialization of youth sports

In "Until It Hurts: America's Obsession with Youth Sports and How It Harms Our Kids" (Beacon Press), author Mark Hyman drew upon his years-long experience as a coach, parent, and journalist to examine the harmful side effects of youth sports.  Hyman's report from the front lines was bluntly honest: "With each passing season youth sports seems to stray further and further from its core mission of providing healthy, safe and character-building recreation for children."

Now, three years later, Hyman has returned to the topic.  His latest book, titled "The Most Expensive Game in Town: The Rising Cost of Youth Sports and the Toll on Today's Families" (Beacon Press), examines every aspect of the business of youth sports -- including the dizzying array of products designed for kids, the rising cost of travel and club sports, the increased media coverage (driven by ESPN) and corporate sponsorship of high school sports, and the disparity between the financial haves and have-nots.

Hyman notes that, for companies catering to youth athletes and their pocketbook-wielding parents, times are good.  More children are playing organized sports -- an estimated 41 million of them -- than ever before.  Hyman writes about the cumulative toll of commercialization: "How is the youth sports economy affecting our kids?  And what stresses, financial and otherwise, is it imposing on families?  How is the great sloshing of dollars distorting the experience that we want for children when they leap off the starting block or dribble down the lane?"

And, Hyman wonders, "Is there any way to turn off the spigot?"

A longtime journalist, Hyman also teaches at George Washington University in the sports management program, on topics ranging from sports law to sports communications.  SportsLetter spoke with Hyman by phone from his home in Baltimore.

--David Davis

SL Interview: Directors of Oscar-nominated documentary "Undefeated"

Since the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Science began awarding Oscars for the Best Documentary feature film in 1943, 16 documentary films involving sports have been nominated for the honor: "The Conquest of Everest" (1953), "Torero!" (1957), "The Horse With the Flying Tail" (1960), "La Grande Olimpiade" (1961), "The Legendary Champions" (1968), "The Olympics in Mexico" (1969), "Jack Johnson" (1970), "On Any Sunday" (1971), "The Great American Cowboy" (1973), "The Man Who Skied Down Everest" (1975), "Going the Distance" (1979), "Hank Aaron: Chasing the Dream" (1995), "When We Were Kings" (1996), "One Day in September" (1999), "On the Ropes" (1999), and "Murderball" (2005).

To that prestigious list add "Undefeated," which was nominated as Best Documentary feature in 2011.  Co-directed by Dan Lindsay and T.J. Martin, "Undefeated" follows the fortunes of the Manassas High School football team during the 2009 season.  This intimate and inspiring film focuses on four personalities: Coach Bill Courtney and three players -- O.C. Brown, Montrail "Money" Brown (no relation) and Chavis Daniels -- as the Tigers attempt to break the school's 110-year playoff jinx.

Like many of the other Oscar-nominated titles, "Undefeated" is a sports documentary in name only.  Lindsay and Martin use a season of high-school football to chronicle the lives of three adolescents on the cusp of manhood as well as the relationships they forge with their coach.  The four come from vastly different backgrounds: Courtney is a white, middle-aged, successful businessman; his players are African-American teens whose inner-city neighborhood of North Memphis is reeling from unemployment and violence.  And yet, as Lindsay and Martin show, coach and players transcend the seemingly enormous chasm with respect and compassion.

Wrote Eric Sondheimer in the Los Angeles Times: "If you want to know how playing high school football can teach lessons in life, the documentary 'Undefeated' is a must see. . . . 'Undefeated' captures the contradictions, the struggles, the successes and the failures with a realistic, compelling presentation."

Lindsay and Martin previously tag-teamed on "Last Cup: Road to the World Series of Beer Pong" (2008).  "Undefeated" premiered at the South by Southwest Film Festival in March of 2011, and then was acquired by the Weinstein Company.  One of its producers is Seth Gordon, who directed the acclaimed video-game documentary "The King of Kong: A Fistful of Quarters" (2007).

SportsLetter interviewed the two Los Angeles-based directors by phone as they made the media rounds required of Academy Award nominees.

-David Davis

SL Interview: "Run to the East" director Henry Lu

Director Henry Lu cut his creative teeth working for Wieden + Kennedy, the advertising agency best known for its groundbreaking Nike commercials.  But when he read an article about high school runners living on Native American reservations in the Southwest, he decided it was time to make a feature-length documentary film.

Distance running has long been a traditional pursuit among Indians in North America.  The lineage of elite runners extends from Deerfoot, the Seneca star from the 19th century; to Canada's Tom Longboat, the 1907 Boston Marathon winner; to Louis Tewanima, the Hopi silver medalist in the 10,000 at the 1912 Stockholm Olympics; to Billy Mills, the surprise winner in the 10,000 at the 1964 Tokyo Olympics.

Today, the need for Native American youth to exercise has taken on added urgency.  Running, Lu notes, is an inexpensive, accessible way to help teens deal with the myriad physical and mental health challenges they face on the reservation, including high rates of Type 2 diabetes and suicide.  Running can also lead to a college scholarship, thus providing the means for kids to gain career and life direction.

In "Run to the East," Lu follows three Native American runners as they navigate school, sports, family and life on the reservation.  Their journey to gain the all-important college scholarship is at once inspiring and sobering.  The same can be said for Lu's heartfelt film.

SportsLetter spoke to Lu while he was in Los Angeles to screen the film at the 8th annual Red Nation Film Festival.
--David Davis