Panel Discusses Women’s Athletics

Female athletes must raise awareness of their games and sports to combat chronically low attendance and encourage others to take up athletics, panelists said at a discussion of collegiate women’s sports last night.

Participants called limited participation and turnout for women’s sporting events troubling, and said that athletes and Harvard College must better promote their games.

“We have an obligation to support women, and we don’t do a great job at that,” said Kathy Delany-Smith, head coach of the women’s basketball team and moderator of the panel.

Panelists and audience members discussed using the internet to publicize events and dedicating shuttles to take students to and from games.

“We want women to feel a responsibility to go to a game, even if it’s cold out and they don’t want to cross the bridge,” Delany-Smith said. “Just go to the game, paint your face, and cheer them on.”

Speakers said the lackluster attendance reflected broader issues discouraging participation in women’s sports, which they said suffer from a false comparison to male athletics, leading to lack of female athlete role models.

Panelist Wendy Healy, general manager of recreation at Harvard, said female participation in athletics is also affected because some women are self-conscious about going to gyms or exercising. The group urged women to fight such a “stigma” and get active.

“Recreation should be part of every woman’s life,” said Delany-Smith.

Panelist Liz O’Leary, head coach of the women’s heavyweight crew team, encouraged women to join teams, saying lessons learned from playing a sport transcend many aspects of a woman’s life.

“You learn how networking and camaraderie help you beyond your sport,” she said.

“I learned as much, if not more, through basketball as through academic programs,” said panelist and former basketball player Jessica C. Gelman ’97, who now works for the New England Patriots. “Supporting a team in college is much like supporting a department now.”

Participants said events like last night’s panel, hosted by Harvard Athletics and Harvard College Women’s Center, are important to combat problems facing women’s athletics. But basketball player Emma C. Moretzsohn ’09 said far more needed to be done to promote sports like hers.

“Panels like this help, but we have to get word out,” said Moretzsohn. “We need to tell people to come to games, tell our friends.”