Male Coaches: Never have one-on-one private interactions with female athletes

NightNinja13 wrote:

So if you're running a practice and you want to see how an athlete is feeling after a rep, you drag your assistant coach along with you for the conversation? What about post-race, if a kid comes over for a breakdown and you're the only one there you run away? Or if you have extra help and one kid shows up you cancel it? This seems insane.

Lol...post race where exactly? Kid can feel free to cry in the middle of all the team tents surrounded by hundreds of people all he wants.

I'm saying in the general bedlam of a post-race scenario, if one kid comes up to you to talk about the race, and there's no one else around according to Welp that's completely out of bounds and something he would never do.

NightNinja13 wrote:

So if you're running a practice and you want to see how an athlete is feeling after a rep, you drag your assistant coach along with you for the conversation? What about post-race, if a kid comes over for a breakdown and you're the only one there you run away? Or if you have extra help and one kid shows up you cancel it? This seems insane.

Just have these conversations in a visible open area not in a corner, stairwell or closed office.

If a kid is upset after a race and hugs you pat her on the shoulder and step away making sure everyone saw you move away.

My solution for this is to strike the fear of God into my kids. They know a false accusation against me is asking for trouble. I am 200 lbs of prime Austin beefcake, I could snap these WASP offspring like twigs.

welp wrote:

I'm a teacher and a coach and I've made it personal policy to 1) Always have at least one other person, preferably an adult, when interacting with any student-athlete and 2) Always address the student-athlete as if the child's parent is right there beside you.

Doing this has save me twice from accusations that could have been damaging. Having a witness AND saying the right things have saved my job.

You couldn't pay me enough to put up with such crap. I'm glad I switched from coaching HS (boys only) to open/masters decades ago. Doesn't it get on your nerves that accusations can spring up at any time with no basis?

huh what wrote:

WAHT YOU CANT CONTEOL YOURSELF? YUO THINK WOMEN ARE LIA RS?????

Some women lie, correct.

WinnytheBish wrote:

Just leave the door open at all times when you meet with athletes.

My father was a professor for many years and that's what he always did when a female student would come to his office.

WinnytheBish wrote:

wawaweewa wrote:

Right, because false accusations by crazy women never happen. OP, i'll do you one better, always keep a camera going in your office (it's very useful for situations other than this as well).

Lol yeah....that will go over great that you're filming private conversations with your athletes. Where are all of these "crazy women" that you're imagining? One or two a year? Schedule a meeting time, leave the door wide open, document the questions you asked in that meeting on an excel sheet to refer to. Most athletic departments will support a coach who has a well-documented resource to refer to. If there is an argument or something in the meeting , write what that argument is about.

It's not rocket science guys.

A simplistic view of life.

The thing is, IF there is an accusation and if you are found to be 100% in the clear, there will always be a stain on your name and reputation. People remember, "Oh yeah, didn't X say he made a pass at her or something?" They rarely remember the outcome.

As I've pointed out, while this certainly does occur, it's extremely rare. It saddens me that people would not get into coaching because they believe they're going to be the victims of some elaborate scam to get them fired/arrested by devious high school kids.

Just social distance and wear a mask around female co-workers or athletes if you are a coach. That nonsense policy actually makes sense in this situation.

Having a strong relationship with your athletes does not guarantee anything when meeting with a female one on one! At their age anything can be said and they can turn on you for whatever reason. First hand experience.

Pathetic post of the day.

ClubRunnah wrote:

IF there is an accusation and if you are found to be 100% in the clear, there will always be a stain on your name and reputation. People remember, "Oh yeah, didn't X say he made a pass at her or something?" They rarely remember the outcome.

This.

As a 20-something male coach of college women I was accused by someone I didn't know (a woman not on my team) of acting improperly. Though the accusation was factually false--the woman was either badly mistaken or simply crazy--and hence could not be proved, the mere fact that I was accused meant that I lost my team (a team I had started, actually) and ultimately had to leave town. But that was 30+ years ago and eventually I *was* able to find coaching employment at other colleges.

Fast forward to the last few years. A good friend and longtime women's coach had left the sport for a couple years, missed it, and applied for and was hired for a position (coaching men and women) across the country. Before he started his duties, that college received an email from one of his former athletes (who'd been stalking him and his girlfriend/fiancee), accusing him of improprieties at his previous school. She also sent an email to the members of his prospective new team.

Now, it turned out that this woman included verifiable lies in her emails--suggesting, for instance, that there'd been multiple Title IX complaints against the guy, when in fact the Title IX office at his previous school sent a letter saying that he'd never been complained about--but *the mere fact of the accusation* meant that his new school "encouraged" him to accept a settlement and leave the position. And because this is the Age of the Internet, that accusation will never go away and this guy, a top D1 coach with multiple all-Americans and just a great person, will never be able to coach again. It's a genuine loss for the sport.

He and I have coached hundreds, if not thousands, of women over the years and the vast majority were wonderful people. But in fact it only takes one crazy, or jealous, or simply mistaken individual to ruin a coach's career, and anything a coach can reasonably do to prevent that situation is a good idea IMO.

dpcldprke0fk wrote:

Having a strong relationship with your athletes does not guarantee anything when meeting with a female one on one! At their age anything can be said and they can turn on you for whatever reason. First hand experience.

The contempt people have for women on this site never fails to astonish me.

NightNinja13 wrote:

As I've pointed out, while this certainly does occur, it's extremely rare. It saddens me that people would not get into coaching because they believe they're going to be the victims of some elaborate scam to get them fired/arrested by devious high school kids.

The coach I was responding to had to fend off two accusations. That is not "rare" in my book. And it doesn't take an "elaborate scam" for a disgruntled athlete to start a rumor or even make an accusation.

OTOH we have recently seen cases of coaches of very successful programs get caught and prosecuted for inappropriate behavior (the U.S. Gymnastics team doctor being among the most egregious) so the "crazy" goes both ways.

I think it is important to get a balance. I liked the advice by 'coach' the poster earlier who talked about whether it's boys or girls, or you are male or female, just have all of the conversations out in the open.

I suppose act like a teacher. Don't invite kids (I mean under 18s) around to your house and so on.

But then that is difficult regarding transportation and what if there are children you trust or who cannot get home? One of the places I used to train, the coach was amazing. He had a boot full of spikes for children who did not have any, he drove loads of us around, he is probably still doing that for all I know. This has gone on for maybe 50 years with zero problems.

I am wondering if litigation culture is at the root of all of this. You see it in other areas as well. It is sad.

Spoiling something really innocent.

YMMV wrote:

NightNinja13 wrote:

As I've pointed out, while this certainly does occur, it's extremely rare. It saddens me that people would not get into coaching because they believe they're going to be the victims of some elaborate scam to get them fired/arrested by devious high school kids.

The coach I was responding to had to fend off two accusations. That is not "rare" in my book. And it doesn't take an "elaborate scam" for a disgruntled athlete to start a rumor or even make an accusation.

OTOH we have recently seen cases of coaches of very successful programs get caught and prosecuted for inappropriate behavior (the U.S. Gymnastics team doctor being among the most egregious) so the "crazy" goes both ways.

Do you have any evidence to prove that this occurs regularly?

There's about 24,000 public high schools in the United States. Let's say 20,000 of them have track teams, and each track team is going to have 2 coaches per gender (we'll be conservative). So we're talking in any given year about roughly 80,000 track coaches in the US. How many do you think have been fired for acting inappropriately towards a student athlete? 1%? If so that's 8,000 coaches. It seems like if 8,000 coaches were getting fired, it would be a much bigger story! Reality is it's probably closer to 1% of 1%, maybe 10/15 coaches at absolute most in any given year who get fired for this.

Obviously there are going to be more that get accused of stuff, but there's no way this is an epidemic the way some people on this board are describing it.

For those who have been falsely accused, I'm truly sorry as that is clearly a nightmare scenario and I don't mean to belittle your pain and suffering. I just want to make the point to those reading this that these types of things are rare occurrences that can almost always be avoided by taking some common-sense steps like the ones mentioned here (keeping doors open for meetings, not giving athletes rides home, etc.)

You're more likely to die of COVID than to get fired for false sexual misconduct allegations.

Maybe it can't be avoided though if there is someone horrible. It is not their fault (the people who did nothing wrong, just wanted to coach and help).

Like YMMV says, it is horrible what has happened in sports (abusive coaches, and I remember reading some really horrible ones towards boys - football - as well).

What is the answer because in the past - people were hurt and it was covered up/not talked about. Now it is talked about and that is good.

But also there wasn't this level of allegation. Which can wreck peoples lives in a different way.

I just think it's sad that something innocent (helping children) got affected.