By French Grace
Every day, millions of young athletes across the United States practice and compete in sports expecting to have fun and gain valuable life lessons about teamwork and perseverance.
Every young athlete, along with their families, expects and has faith that their coaches and trainers will do everything within their power to keep them safe as they strive to develop, learn, and grow.
However, too many young athletes’ safe, trusting relationship with adult coaches turns into one of exploitation and abuse that can leave long-lasting scars, as the recent NJ Advance Media report on sexual assault affecting New Jersey’s child sports community (Prey to Play) makes evident.
In order to address this extremely concerning issue, it is crucial to first document and raise awareness of known incidents. However, this reporting merely scratches the surface of the problem’s actual extent. Athletes who are afraid and ashamed of dealing with a trauma that may permanently affect their lives and their ability to participate in their sport fail to disclose countless more incidents.
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According to our analysis, since 2015, 118 coaches or trainers have been charged with sexual offenses, exposing risky weaknesses in safety protocols and background checks.
Lawmakers in New Jersey have a chance to set an example for safer sports environments. Our objective should be to establish robust, enforceable protections that place athlete safety ahead of institutional prestige, rather than just starting another awareness campaign.
The first step is education. It is crucial to teach young athletes and their parents how to see any warning signs and what makes a good coach-athlete connection. All youth sports trainers and coaches should be required to complete training on trauma-informed coaching and abuse prevention. Athletes must understand their rights and every interaction between coaches and athletes must be observable and interruptible.
To guarantee prevention and accountability, sports organizations must put in place transparent, easily available, and secure procedures. All coaches and employees should be required to undergo background checks. Athletes must understand how to report improper behavior without worrying about reprisals.
Legislators in Michigan gave a good example of what meaningful action looks like after the devastating sexual abuse convictions at Michigan State University. They passed comprehensive reforms that improved background checks, mandated reporting requirements, and extended the statute of limitations for survivors.
Stronger safeguards, such as required abuse prevention training for all child sports staff and open reporting procedures that shield athletes from reprisals, are something that New Jersey can and ought to do.
Creating national policies that emphasize prevention and education is the most effective way to safeguard young athletes. However, states like New Jersey must take measures to safeguard young athletes until federal legislation is taken.
The price of doing nothing to safeguard young athletes will be measured in broken lives and lost childhoods rather than in monetary terms. Better is due to athletes. Parents are entitled to better. We are capable of bringing about significant change.
