Coaches Who Harass and More: Why Aren’t They Fired?
Look at this chart of mental health needs created by Crazyhead Comics. Note these layers — — support, healthy relationships, empathy. Now ask yourself about the behavior of the Harvard University women’s hockey coach which included, but was not limited to, berating players, hazing, disrespect, naked skates where women players were encouraged to skid on the ice on their fronts (leading to ice burns and bleeding nipples). This piece is about institutional failure, not about why the coach did what she did for decades and what sanctions should be placed on her although the latter topic is worthy too.
See attached articles on the coach’s behavior. You can’t make this stuff up, and, get this: it was repeatedly reported within the University. This was not an unknown set of behaviors. They had been going on for years. People knew.
Where Are the Role Models?
Here’s what I want to know. If a university with as much standing, reputational heritage, stature and money as Harvard cannot and will not sanction a misbehaving coach (a kindly characterization), which universities will?
Why wouldn’t Harvard publicly deal with this issue (privately too) and say, write and distribute something like:
This coach’s actions are not acceptable here or anywhere. We cannot have coaches who don’t have the students best interests at heart and who behave in ways that are denigrating and discriminatory and abusive. Winning isn’t everything and there is no excuse for repeated poor coach behavior. It is inconsistent with who we are as an institution. Accordingly and without delay, based on a thorough investigation and interviews with current and past players and assistant coaches, we are dismissing the Harvard Women’s Hockey Coach instanter. She did a disservice to her players and herself and this university.
Whether there are NCAA violations will be determined and we will self report the actions. Whether the coach committed criminal acts will be determined by the appropriate authorities and we have notified them. We will be offering free ongoing mental health counseling to all current and past players who were on this coach’s teams, and those who seek/sought help from other providers will be reimbursed for past and present and future counseling. This is the least we can do to right the wrongs committed under our watch. We ask all affected students and alums to reach out to our specifically designated free hotline (XXX — xxx-xxxx) to get whatever mental health needs they have met and reimbursed. Reports and actions based on the hotline are confidential.
No such statement ever appeared. The coach has not been fired. And I ask yet again: if one of our top universities does not role model quality behavior and sanction misbehavior among its faculty and staff and coaches, what institution will?
There would have been zero or negligible long term damage to the institution itself if Harvard had acted fast. (Yes, students/alums would have been damaged). Instead, there would have been a showing, in fact, of a commitment to integrity and quality sports. But, by delaying and allowing bad behavior to persist over years, the institution has done damage to many and it is lasting and recompense is in order.
I Don’t Get It
Still, I just don’t get it. Maybe in the 1950’s (women didn’t play collegiate hockey then if my memory and understanding of the law is right), it was more “acceptable” for coaches to be tyrants and institutions did not respond to complaints if they were even made or they were responded to behind the scenes. Maybe that’s true, although I don’t excuse bad behavior then either. And surely we didn’t have as public a way to learn of the bad behavior and repeated reports to those in charge of athletics decades ago. People are starting to report although even now this isn’t easy and sadly to this very day, there is a steep price for reporting wrongs. Just ask Dr. Blasey Ford and Professor Anita Hill.
Our world has surely been rocked off its axis over the past several years. Mental health is declining. Students are struggling. And yet, a leading university thinks itself above the norms of behavior we ask for and teach about and laud.
I worry about our educational institutions. I worry about trauma. I worry about the next generation. I worry about all the disasters surrounding us — those person made and those nature made. I worry about our capacity to be decent and kind and connected to others. I worry about violence.
I did not think I or anyone else had to worry in 2023 about elite universities ignoring bad behavior for years. Didn’t we learn from prior scandals? Didn’t we learn from Penn State? Didn’t we learn from coaches being bribed to let even non-athletes onto athletic teams? Didn’t we learn from the Jeffrey Epstein saga that dragged in a host of well-known individuals into his orbit? Haven’t we learned about the epigenetic transmission of trauma?
Beats me. I just don’t get it. Can’t be money. Can’t be reputation. Can’t be ignorance. Can’t be denial. Explain it to me.
Here’s one thought: Could it be that Harvard considers itself so above the norms that govern the rest of us that, as an institution, it can ignore blatant misbehavior because of pride, elitism and hubris? Some individuals see themselves as above the law too. We know about them.
Whatever the reason for Harvard not acting (and why the coach behaved as she did is another story altogether), it can’t be good. Of that I am sure.
