WMC Exclusive: Basketball and Babies by Melissa Silverstein - June 09, 2006 |
June 09, 2006 For the Intro The WNBA celebrates its 10th anniversary this summer, and with 14 teams, the league’s doubters have been silenced. But each The athletes of the WNBA are the best of the best, and their league has a supportive pregnancy policy. Not every athlete is so lucky. In The Heart of the Game, directed by Ward Serrill, the Roosevelt High Roughriders are stuck in the losing column until tax professor and novice Darnellia gave birth to her daughter Trekayla in December 2002. When she tried to return to the team as a senior, she had too few academic credits to play because of missed school during her pregnancy. She made up the credits yet still was denied eligibility under Washington state rules that govern high school athletics—her pregnancy was not a “hardship,” a designation that would allow her to make up the credits and qualify. Darnellia had hoped, through an athletic scholarship, to fulfill her dream of becoming the first in her family to go to college. She had letters of interest from a number of schools before she got pregnant. After the baby the interest pretty much disappeared, and with it, Darnellia's dreams of a college education and maybe even the WNBA. Women's basketball has come a long way since the first game at Smith College on March 21, 1893—with a major boost from Title IX passage in 1972. It's no news flash that young women accidentally get pregnant, and Title IX regulations would seem to offer students some protection. They state that recipients of federal funds “must treat disabilities related to pregnancy the same way as any other temporary disability in any medical or hospital benefit, service, plan or policy which they offer to students. . . . Following this leave, the student must be reinstated to her original status." Yet no uniform policy at either the school or professional level protects a pregnant athlete’s rights. The resulting insecurity, especially for athletes on scholarship, can cause women to hide their pregnancies or have an abortion. Of course, the guys who get women pregnant suffer no repercussions, financial or otherwise. Stepping into the void, Elizabeth Sorensen, a nurse and the faculty athletics representative at Wright State University,has become an authority on athletes and pregnancy. She created a policy for Wright State, and is now trying to build momentum for a comprehensive, proactive policy that focuses on an athlete’s well being. In 2003, she submitted her policy to the NCAA, but the collegiate athletic governing body has not taken up the issue. The women's community is taking notice, however. The Women's Sports Foundation is about to release a its own position paper on athletic competition and pregnancy, and the National Women's Law Center has also begun to consider the issue.
No one pretends that it's easy to return to play at the same level after a pregnancy. But for WNBA players, basketball is their job. Although a league veteran, Allison Feaster was still nervous when she got pregnant: "I was really concerned about just announcing my pregnancy and how it would affect my ability to stay in my job. I’d say put the pressure on the lawmakers to do their part so that we are protected.” Darnellia Russell would love the opportunity to show a school that she has come back from her pregnancy. She is waiting for the phone to ring with a college coach giving her that chance. Melissa Silverstein is a writer who edits the morning news briefing for the Women’s Media Center. |