Persisting: How Male Coaches Can Better Serve Their Students
By Jasmine Stidham, Teacher and Coach at Harvard-Westlake and Assistant Coach at Dartmouth College
Many people within the debate community have voiced concerns about the lack of women and non-cis men coaches for decades. There is a disproportionate level of white men in debate who hold positions of power which tends to result in more men being awarded coaching jobs across the board. When an unequal balance exists, it negatively impacts students who identify as non-cis men. Women, trans and gender non-conforming students must often go through debate without any coaches who can understand their lived experiences and advocate for them. These students sometimes feel isolated, alone, ignored, belittled, and unable to openly share their concerns with coaches because they fear further mistreatment and indifference if they speak out. This is especially true for women of color who experience even more barriers to equitable coaching. I could theoretically write a novel about the gendered dynamics of coaching and why we need more non-cis men in leadership roles, but that would not help male coaches understand how they can better serve all their students.
I have been approached by cis men countless times with the question of, “How can I do better?” It seems like many of them genuinely want to be advocates for the women on their team, but they just have no clue what that entails. The remainder of this article is designed to offer a series of “pro-tips” for cis men coaches who want to do better. Of course, this list may not be exhaustive, and we invite everyone to share their own experiences and advice to create a comprehensive list that can be shared in the future.
So, dudes, this one goes out to you.
What Can You Do?
Prioritize Retention
Most men reading this article likely have girls on their team. You should prioritize their retention and needs over the white men on your team because it is infinitely more likely that girls on your squad consider leaving debate due to sexism and isolation. This may sound controversial, but it really isn’t if you consider the gendered dynamics at play. The white male debaters you coach most likely feel at home already; they have plenty of friends on the team, you probably have male coaches they bond with, and they do not experience the pushout factor that girls face. So, what can you do? When you are focusing on your novices, emailing parents, talking to kids about camp, or trying to get students to continue debating, you should prioritize reaching out to the girls on your team, especially women of color. Send encouraging messages, tell them how you have observed all of their progress, and explain why they are a valued member of the team. Oftentimes women stop debating because they do not think they are as valued as their white male counterparts. You can address this by ensuring you are giving more energy to retaining women debaters and recruiting additional ones.
Check Your Prefs
This one is a bit trickier as there are a host of issues at play when it comes to judge preferences. Some circuits do not have the ability to rank judges at all, and in certain regions it seems almost meaningless to focus on judge preferences because the judging does not end up mattering. Additionally, in some instances we do not always know how the judge identifies so it becomes more difficult to assess. However, judging can still have an immense impact on women debaters and paying attention to your judge preferences can make a huge difference for girls on your team. When evaluating your prefs, you should consider the following:
1) What does the demographic of your top 20 look like?
2) How many of those do you know identify as women/non-cis men?
3) Why are you preffing certain people towards the bottom?
4) About how often do your students get non-cis men as judges?
5) Where are the women of color on your pref sheet?
6) Why are you ranking all of these young white dudes so high?
7) Have you asked your women debaters if they are okay with their prefs?
Prefs matter. It matters when girls only get white men as judges consistently. It matters when you, as a male coach, constantly believe that young white men who just graduated are better judges than experienced women coaches. Whether you choose to acknowledge it or not, sexism influences the way you rank judges and it negatively impacts your women debaters. To address this, you should think critically about why you rate judges the way you do and actively try to make your prefs less sexist. Talk to women on your team about the judges they have had and ask if they have experienced any issues. You should never assume that your women debaters want the same judges as the men on your team. The only way you could possibly know if this is the case is if you discuss these issues with women on your team.
Bring Menstrual Products to Tournaments
Most coaches bring certain medical/first-aid items with them to tournaments. We usually have a first-aid kit, or a bag full of Band-Aids, cough drops, Advil, etc. However, most cis men I know do not carry one of the most commonly needed items for students at tournaments: menstrual products. Cis men usually do not feel the need to carry menstrual products because they don’t believe it’s their responsibility since they do not personally menstruate, or they have some irrational aversion to tampons because they are “icky” things that are “for girls.” These are not good reasons to not carry menstrual products. People get their periods at unexpected times, which includes debate tournaments. If you have ever experienced getting your period during the 1AR then you know how vital it is to quickly get a tampon or pad unless you want to bleed everywhere. It is more likely that someone on your team will get their period at a debate tournament compared to other injuries or medical issues. If you do not carry menstrual products because you personally believe that it is the responsibility of the debater, then why do you bring any first-aid items at all? Why is it not also the responsibility of debaters to bring their own Advil or Band-Aids since there is a decent chance they may need those items at a tournament? In reality, the main reasons why cis men choose not to carry menstrual products is tied to their immature and unreasonable fear of menstruation. Instead, you should bring a few tampons/pads to tournaments with you and let it be known that you carry them so your students know they can count on you.
Fix Your Dress Code
Many schools have some sort of dress code for debate tournaments. In local or lay circuits it is more prevalent because students are often required to wear suits and dress clothes because it is an expectation for the judging pool. On the national circuit there is more flexibility when it comes to tournament attire because the judge pool typically does not care about clothing as much. So, on some level, dress codes are unavoidable for debaters if they want to win over certain judges, but there is a way coaches can ensure their team’s dress code is not sexist. For example, you should not require girls to wear particular clothing items that are usually uncomfortable. Heels can be extremely painful to walk in during tournaments because the days are long, and it is rare to find a pair of heels that cause no pain after wearing them for 12+ hours. Requiring skirts/dresses is another example of a gendered clothing expectation. If you demand your students to wear skirts or dresses, you need to reevaluate your policy. Not everyone feels comfortable wearing skirts/dresses for a variety of reasons and students should not be penalized for not wearing them. Additionally, you should not police a student’s outfit because you personally feel that it is inappropriate. Now, there are a few obvious exceptions to this. A student wearing clothing with hate speech, for example, should clearly be banned. But if your concern is a girl is wearing an outfit you believe is too “scandalous” or “revealing,” then you should take a moment to think about why you feel that way. If you truly feel that an outfit is too revealing and you must address it, make sure you have a conversation in a way that is private and respectful. A tournament dress code should emphasize comfort and confidence, not archaic standards.
Equalize the Labor
“Emotional labor, as I define it, is emotion management and life management combined. It is the unpaid, invisible work we do to keep those around us comfortable and happy.”
― Gemma Hartley, Fed Up: Emotional Labor, Women, and the Way Forward
This quote is undoubtedly applicable to debate. Women are tasked with doing team household work that ranges from cleaning squad rooms, acting as mother figures to younger students, having to manage squad drama, running errands, organizing team fundraisers, bringing snacks, comforting others, and more. On many teams it is standard for the older varsity women to be assigned novice coaching duties because it is assumed that girls are more nurturing and responsible compared to young boys. Women are elided with notions of care and mothering, which results in gendered responsibilities on debate teams. Girls on your team probably do a lot of this work without complaining because we are taught not to complain. Your women debaters probably wish the boys were equally tasked with helping the novices, or with organizing team fundraisers and activities. This division of labor happens on almost every single team, albeit in different ways. What can you do to address it? First, you can recognize there is a problem and try to observe the ways in which it manifests. Second, you can task yourself with resolving the problem by delegating these responsibilities to more boys on your team. Ask the boys to organize the bake sale or clean the debate room. Ask them to help the novices after school so the older girls on your team can actually have time to focus on tournament preparation. It is up to you, the coach, to address the unequal division of labor on your team- not the women’s.
From Our Girls Debate Editors:
Jaya Nayar:
For me, there are four main ways cis men coaches can act as good allies. First, they can emphasize arguments about fem IR and domestic violence in whatever topic their students are debating. My coach, Scott Phillips, helped me a lot in learning about feminist arguments, and was the one who initially taught me them when I was in 9th grade. It’s super important that we encourage women to read more feminist literature since it carries relevance to their lives, and we should encourage the debate community, more broadly, to research feminism so that women’s voices (which are traditionally marginalized in academia) can be heard. Second, male head coaches can hire more women. There’s a lack of women in the debate community which greatly affects younger, female debaters who feel discouraged when they see only men in late elimination rounds and only have male role models. Additionally, many female debaters may not feel comfortable going to male coaches and asking for tampons or pads. Hiring female coaches provides female debaters role models that encourage them to stay in debate (which then reinforces the position of women in the community). Female coaches also help make those debaters feel more comfortable at tournaments, only further increasing retention. Thirdly, and in a similar vein, coaches should be actively encouraging women to run for leadership positions on their teams, as well as put them in these roles, so that younger debaters have someone to look up to. It also gives female debaters much needed recognition for the hard work they put in, actively combatting structural barriers that, on some teams, prevent them from being given such positions. Finally, male coaches can support women by watching them in rounds where they feel isolated and surrounded by men. Very frequently, I find myself debating a cis man, with a panel of 3 male judges, in a room filled entirely by cis men, and sometimes it can be very daunting. Obviously it would be ideal to have more women judges and coaches to be in the room with the debater, but in the case where that’s not possible, male coaches should accompany their female debaters and provide support for an otherwise unsettling situation.
Jessa Glassman:
One thing that I think our community needs to become more aware of is aggressive post-rounding, particularly of women judges. In important rounds, certain cis male debaters or groups of coaches bombard women with harsh questions and discredit their qualifications by using forceful and dismissive behavior to express disagreement with an unfavorable decision. Women judges shouldn’t have to deal with this, and they certainly shouldn’t have to put lines in their paradigms discouraging this behavior in rounds they are judging.
Alexandra Mork:
A huge problem in debate is female dropout. I noticed that when I did parliamentary debate and novice debate, there were probably more women participants than men, which demonstrates that there is clearly a very high interest in debate among women. However, as I gradually reached more advanced levels of debate, I noticed less and less female participation. This is most visible on the highest levels of national debate— this year, only 7 out of 29 elimination round participants were non-cis men and both this and last year, only one out of the eight quarterfinalists was a woman. On my team, there were only a few older, female debaters for me to look up. I think that the high rates of dropout can be explained by the fact that many women and gender non-conforming individuals often don’t feel included by the “boys-club” of debate, are often talked over by male opponents, and discriminated against by judges, debaters, and coaches alike. I really appreciated how my coaches sought to rectify these inequalities by supporting me and my teammates from the beginning of our careers, reaching out to us even as novices to help us in any way possible, and encouraging us to continue with debate even when we encountered difficulties. The impact of their support is evident in the increased rates of female retention in my grade and the grades below mine.