Latest / The Gill Athletics Track and Field Connections Podcast / women4women

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women4women · The Gill Athletics Track and Field Connections Podcast

• 0:00
  OK, Hey, little bonus material for you here today.
• 0:04
  We're going to introduce you to Megan Orgaman.
• 0:07
  You're going to actually meet her again in April and May when
• 0:10
  we do our state track and field high school series of every
• 0:14
  state. She's represents the great state
• 0:16
  of Minnesota. But she helped found or did
• 0:19
  found a really cool organization that I really wanted.
• 0:21
  I thought it was important for us to kind of do a separate
• 0:24
  podcast here that I think it's important for people to hear
• 0:27
  more about this. It's called Women for Women, and
• 0:30
  I'm gonna shut up and let Megan tell us a little bit more, but
• 0:32
  help me welcome Megan Orgemann from Alexander Area High School.
• 0:35
  And Women for Women. Megan, thanks for being here
• 0:37
  today. Thanks for having me, Mike.
• 0:39
  I really appreciate it. Absolutely.
• 0:42
  When I hear about initiatives like this, I think about the
• 0:46
  USTFCCCA has a very strong continually growing women's and
• 0:51
  coaching program, minorities and coaching programs.
• 0:55
  These are extremely important to us here at Gill because we look
• 0:58
  at our athletes and we're you know roughly 5050 men and women.
• 1:02
  We're not roughly I don't think 5050 minority to non minority,
• 1:06
  but but then we look at our coaches and we are nowhere near,
• 1:10
  we're roughly 10 to 15% minority or female coaches.
• 1:14
  So anytime there's a program that can help encourage more
• 1:17
  women or minorities into coaching, that's a extremely
• 1:21
  positive, important thing. And when I heard you had founded
• 1:24
  this program, I just had to learn more and more importantly
• 1:28
  had to help our listeners learn more about this.
• 1:31
  So tell us about this. Why what it is?
• 1:34
  Just give us the whole, the whole skinny on this thing.
• 1:36
  Yeah, a great segue, the USATFCCCA Women in Coaching
• 1:41
  Symposium Clinic. Is where this all came from
• 1:44
  actually. And so Karen Cracow from
• 1:47
  Wisconsin, she is a high school coach from Wisconsin, attended
• 1:50
  this event and said why can't we bring this to Wisconsin?
• 1:53
  And so she started a women for women.
• 1:56
  So let's women number for women, women for women coaches
• 2:00
  symposium in Wisconsin years ago.
• 2:02
  And it drew in hundreds of participants.
• 2:05
  And you know, when we think about.
• 2:08
  Our mission, like you said, we want to support the recruitment
• 2:11
  and the retention of women coaches because we believe it is
• 2:14
  important for female athletes to see their reflection in the
• 2:18
  faces of their coaches. We want our girls to be able to
• 2:20
  see how women lead, to know that they can lead to.
• 2:24
  I really believe strongly in the phrase if she can see her, she
• 2:27
  can be her. It's something I try to live by.
• 2:29
  And and what's another important note is some of our greatest
• 2:33
  advocates are also male coaches and so this is not an exclusive.
• 2:36
  Women only club, this is really gathering lots of people, men
• 2:41
  and women coaches from all over all sports to join in in that
• 2:45
  recruitment and retention of women coaches so that our girls
• 2:48
  can be coached, our girls and women can be coached by other
• 2:50
  women. Because, you know, you mentioned
• 2:53
  the the statistics at the collegiate level.
• 2:54
  It's worse at the high school level there there's even few
• 2:57
  women high school coaches out there for other for female
• 3:01
  athletes. Two things to add 1.
• 3:03
  I'm surprised by that and I certainly know the collegiate
• 3:07
  side of it a little bit better cuz that's where I'm mostly
• 3:09
  involved in former college coach myself.
• 3:12
  On the high school level, my wife is a long term sub, so I
• 3:16
  see high school teachers and the majority.
• 3:17
  I shouldn't say the majority, a lot of them are women so I would
• 3:21
  have assumed more women on the high school coaching side.
• 3:25
  So that surprises me too. Love the initiative of and I
• 3:29
  love that quote. If she could see her, she can be
• 3:30
  here. I think just as importantly, and
• 3:34
  maybe that's too strong of a word, but as important, very
• 3:37
  important is boys can see that, oh, my boss can be a woman and
• 3:42
  that's OK And my coach can be a boss can be a woman.
• 3:45
  And that's OK Like, there's no, that's not a bad thing.
• 3:48
  It's not a stigma type of thing we've had, We've had that
• 3:50
  conversation on past podcasts before.
• 3:52
  So I love that. So talk to us about we
• 3:55
  understand kind of the mission. So what do you do?
• 3:58
  How do you help with that mission then?
• 4:01
  Yeah, so. One of our goals is to create a
• 4:03
  network you know, because traditionally you know.
• 4:08
  White males, amazing white males, not a bash, but have held
• 4:11
  leadership positions and have been the ones that have gathered
• 4:15
  together at clinics. I bet most high school coaches,
• 4:19
  track and field coaches in particular when they go to
• 4:21
  clinics, they can relate to being, you know, in one of, if
• 4:26
  we look at a ratio, maybe one out of 20 attendees are men.
• 4:31
  And so you do definitely feel like there's not many of you in
• 4:33
  spaces at times. So one of our missions is to
• 4:36
  create a network. So space where women can come
• 4:38
  together and talk about their experiences.
• 4:41
  Women for women, a big initiative is to have veteran
• 4:44
  and new coaches in the same space together.
• 4:46
  So these veteran coaches that are mothers or not mothers or
• 4:50
  have different demographic backgrounds, whether it is a
• 4:53
  relationship status. Their sexuality or whatever it
• 4:58
  may be, there's spaces where these women can talk.
• 5:01
  And so when we have these new coaches who feel alone and feel
• 5:03
  on an island and feel like it's too hard and that the systems
• 5:06
  aren't set up to support them for whatever reason, we have
• 5:09
  veterans coaches saying, hey, I did this, you can too.
• 5:12
  Or hey, have you tried this? Or maybe if you talked to your
• 5:15
  AD and got this in place, it would be easier for you.
• 5:17
  So we just have that network to help support.
• 5:21
  Women in coaching, women that are living on the life of of a
• 5:24
  coach. So that's one purpose.
• 5:26
  Yeah. How important is that?
• 5:28
  You know, I I think about what you said there about, you know,
• 5:30
  she can see her. She can be here and you're
• 5:33
  talking. I I took that as you were
• 5:35
  talking specifically of of a female athlete, can see a female
• 5:38
  coach like, oh, well wait a minute.
• 5:40
  Well, then I can be that too. But I wonder, on the same token,
• 5:46
  how do you help either women who want to be in the coaching or
• 5:50
  want to stay in the coaching ranks?
• 5:52
  There's a lot of societal I don't know if pressure is the
• 5:56
  right word, but norms that you can't be a mom when you coach
• 6:02
  and the ones who do that superwoman stuff.
• 6:04
  And by the way, it is superwoman stuff, but it is attainable.
• 6:08
  I hate seeing from the average woman, but from other people as
• 6:10
  well. So how, how do you help with
• 6:13
  with veteran coaches and new coaches in regards to how you
• 6:15
  would navigate, you know, being married, being a professional,
• 6:19
  as far as a teacher, being the extracurricular, as a coach,
• 6:23
  either planning a family or in the midst of the family?
• 6:27
  How, how does that help? And and what are some, maybe
• 6:30
  even some tidbits that you've learned from some of your
• 6:33
  members? That's that's exactly it.
• 6:36
  I mean, if if she can see her, she can be her.
• 6:38
  Extends between coaches, not just athletes to coaches.
• 6:42
  And I think that's really powerful.
• 6:43
  It was actually the primary reason why I took the position
• 6:46
  as president of the coaches Association is because there
• 6:48
  weren't women in that role. And I felt like maybe if I said
• 6:51
  yes to this, other women would step up later and we could, we
• 6:55
  could swing that. And so I think it's important to
• 6:57
  have representation as we know. But, you know, here's an example
• 7:01
  to answer your question. From one of our discussions at
• 7:04
  our Women Coaches Symposium, we had a we had a very lively
• 7:07
  discussion about motherhood and coaching and the societal
• 7:10
  pressures that are placed on women to be the primary
• 7:13
  caregiver or be the coordinator of all things in the home.
• 7:17
  And and that's not every family. But that is a societal pressure.
• 7:21
  And how can we create systems to support that?
• 7:24
  So for example, why aren't we having our National Honor
• 7:26
  Society kids provide free childcare for our coaches so the
• 7:30
  kids can be on campus, maybe even on the field while the
• 7:33
  coaches are coaching and we just have some kids volunteering time
• 7:35
  to hang out with the coaches children.
• 7:38
  And that goes for males too. Like a a male coach could have
• 7:41
  free care care too for their kids.
• 7:43
  So you know, easy solutions that are don't cost money and we we
• 7:46
  brainstorm together. Another thing that I've really
• 7:49
  learned through the Tucker Center.
• 7:50
  The University of Minnesota Tucker Center does a lot of
• 7:52
  research about girls and and women in sports and girls and
• 7:56
  women in coaching. They do a lot.
• 7:57
  They're a powerhouse. They give NCAA programs report
• 7:59
  cards based on their hiring practices a through F grading
• 8:03
  with with women coaches. So the Tucker Center has really
• 8:05
  taught me and many of us to not have a blame the women narrative
• 8:09
  like women aren't coaching because they are mothers.
• 8:13
  Well, women, maybe women could coach if the system supported.
• 8:17
  Mothers in coaching. You know if we had National
• 8:20
  Honor Society kids helping with childcare after school, that
• 8:23
  didn't cost anything. So really looking at it from We
• 8:26
  value these women, we want these women.
• 8:28
  We understand there are societal pressures.
• 8:31
  It is a reality. But it's not her fault.
• 8:33
  Let's try try to create a a system that allows her to to do
• 8:36
  both. You know I'm amazed when I hear
• 8:44
  what's the term I want to use here.
• 8:46
  The angst and the anger of some people that you know because of
• 8:50
  title nines and things like that affirmative action that you know
• 8:55
  I see it on our air quotes your favorite message board let's run
• 9:00
  of you know boy if you're a woman and you have a pulse you
• 9:04
  could get any college coaching job in the world.
• 9:08
  And you know I think about two things with that One is I go
• 9:11
  really we'll go look at all the coaching rosters because I don't
• 9:13
  that's not. I don't see it.
• 9:15
  It's not true. And two, I think of we had
• 9:17
  Lakeidra Stewart on the podcast. The high school coach down in
• 9:21
  Texas was a phenomenal athlete. Boy, if I get this wrong, she's
• 9:26
  going to kill me I think for Texas A&M.
• 9:28
  So phenomenal athlete went on and had a nice career, very
• 9:33
  smart, you know, college educated, etcetera.
• 9:37
  And she could not get a sniff at a college job.
• 9:40
  I mean just it was nothing. And I and I kind of liked it
• 9:43
  because I was like, well, here, you know, this is the narrative.
• 9:45
  Like you're supposed to have any job, but you want the minority
• 9:48
  female as well. But you know, the whole 9,
• 9:49
  right. And and now, you know she's a
• 9:52
  sweet, sweet, sweet mom. She's coaching and destroying it
• 9:57
  down in Texas. Also helped coach football at
• 10:01
  one of her stops as well, which I thought that was just
• 10:03
  extremely cool in regards to like, you can do anything.
• 10:05
  Yeah. So I love that narrative of
• 10:08
  destroying that narrative of like, oh, women, they have it so
• 10:12
  good. They can get any job.
• 10:13
  And it's like, man, you're so blind, go look at the rosters
• 10:16
  out there. The other story I hear a lot in
• 10:20
  this one, it's kind of weird. I may be on the other side of
• 10:22
  this one, is when a woman is a head coach and I'll say
• 10:26
  specifically at a high school program, I don't think it really
• 10:27
  matters. And an official or a games
• 10:32
  committee member will come over and let's say she's standing
• 10:34
  next to her assistant coach who's the male.
• 10:36
  They'll look at the male and say as if he's the head coach and
• 10:40
  and I and I understand why. Why someone would get upset by
• 10:42
  that. But I actually don't get upset
• 10:43
  by that because well, majority are male.
• 10:46
  So that person made a mistake. Let's have some grace here.
• 10:48
  Now that to me the real farce is if that person continues to do
• 10:51
  that. Now if they go, oh, Megan, I'm
• 10:53
  so sorry. You are the head coach.
• 10:54
  Boy, that's my bad. Here's the question, yadda
• 10:56
  yadda. When they come up to you next
• 10:57
  time and still look to the male assistant coach that's a that's
• 11:01
  means we're now the real issue is here.
• 11:03
  How? How do we continue?
• 11:05
  What what role? You know, women certainly need
• 11:08
  to fight for women, but men need to fight for women.
• 11:12
  And we all really, what it really comes down to is we all
• 11:15
  need to fight for equality. Male, female, minority, non
• 11:19
  minority, etcetera. What can here we're speaking
• 11:23
  specifically, you know for this group here, the women for women.
• 11:26
  How can others help? Yeah.
• 11:30
  You know I think it's in very small ways you had I so much of
• 11:35
  what you said I could relate to. You know I when I first became
• 11:38
  the girls head coach they talked to Mike empting the boys head
• 11:41
  coach all the time and he very and it wasn't with I'll intent
• 11:45
  it was just it just shows how strong gender norms are and he
• 11:49
  would just politely say talk to her she's the head coach and so
• 11:52
  that is advocacy him not answering the question for me
• 11:55
  and saying that's a question for the girls coach.
• 11:57
  It's Megan. Is advocacy you know, there when
• 12:00
  I think about I was in my 30 year coaching in high school,
• 12:04
  ever when the head coach position opened up and I had a
• 12:07
  team of male coaches make me apply, they they they shoved me
• 12:12
  into that spot to even apply. We know that women have to be, I
• 12:17
  think it's 97% sure that they are adequate and qualified and
• 12:21
  competent to even throw their name in the ring, while men,
• 12:25
  it's 67%. They're like, well, let's just
• 12:27
  see what happens. And so men, if they you see a
• 12:30
  qualified female, shove her, push her, tell her you will
• 12:34
  support her. And that goes for females too,
• 12:36
  so that she at least puts her application in.
• 12:39
  So that's another really powerful way.
• 12:41
  And that's all on the individual level.
• 12:43
  There's also the systemic level, right, like trying to look at
• 12:46
  systems in schools or in colleges that get in the way and
• 12:51
  then and then trying to be creative with the resources that
• 12:54
  you have finding National Honor, Society, kids.
• 12:57
  Another piece you had talked about gender norms is, you know,
• 13:02
  you said you mentioned officials and how females are interpreted.
• 13:07
  We talk about that as like walking a tightrope as a woman.
• 13:10
  You can't be too strong, you know, 'cause then you might be
• 13:12
  seen as, you know, the B word and you can't be too emotional,
• 13:16
  then you might be seen as weak. And so it's like this tightrope
• 13:19
  and this this dance that we have to.
• 13:22
  Do to prove that we are competent, we also sometimes
• 13:25
  feel like it's it's a feeling. I'm not saying it's a reality
• 13:27
  that we have to be fully researched and we have to know
• 13:32
  10 times more in order to speak because we might be seen as as
• 13:36
  not knowing enough or being too emotional.
• 13:38
  And so having other males let let women fully express anger.
• 13:44
  And not be like wow, she's a she's AB word and say she's
• 13:46
  passionate, right? Just the same words that would
• 13:48
  be attached to a male who's passionate and and maybe yelling
• 13:52
  or what. However they're expressing their
• 13:54
  feelings, those same words that are attached to men should be
• 13:56
  attached to females too. So language is powerful.
• 13:59
  So how we use our words that kind of hits that societal norm
• 14:02
  level of it. So really, the Tucker Center has
• 14:05
  taught me this, trying to address the problem from an
• 14:07
  individual and institutional and a societal level and looking at
• 14:11
  all those layers. Is our best way to address the
• 14:14
  problem and then creating the network where people can talk
• 14:17
  and support each other, all genders, to make sure that
• 14:20
  people don't quit when they're tired and exhausted?
• 14:23
  When I talk about the health of track and field, I'm very
• 14:28
  bullish on encouraging track coaches to go into
• 14:32
  administrative roles because in the administration is where a
• 14:35
  lot of the important decisions about our sport are happening,
• 14:38
  happening. And I would certainly love to
• 14:39
  have people who understand our sport and maybe have passion for
• 14:42
  our sport be in those positions. How can we?
• 14:45
  So, you know, we're we're kind of talking about track coaches
• 14:48
  here in the on the woman's side, but how can we also encourage
• 14:51
  women to be more in the administration role and
• 14:54
  therefore hiring the next track coaches, making decisions about
• 14:58
  our sports specifically, but of course all other sports as well.
• 15:01
  How do we encourage more women to go into the administration
• 15:04
  role as well as the track coach world?
• 15:07
  I think it also helps. It happens on the ground level
• 15:10
  and on the institutional level. We know that just because of our
• 15:13
  own personal bias, we tend to hire or surround ourselves.
• 15:16
  But the people that feel like us, that look like us, that feel
• 15:19
  like us, that talk like us, that have the same beliefs, so that
• 15:21
  unconscious bias is present. So we have to check ourselves,
• 15:25
  you know and we have to create representation in those hiring
• 15:28
  practices. So I think I'm a great example
• 15:30
  of I would say I I lean on the side of a confident female and I
• 15:34
  still needed an army of people to push me into this role.
• 15:37
  I think athletic directors and administration need to find
• 15:41
  those rising stars and nurture them and mentor them so that
• 15:45
  they know that when it when that position opens that.
• 15:47
  Even if they don't check all the boxes, they don't.
• 15:50
  They aren't fully qualified that they will be OK and they will be
• 15:52
  supported knowing that they have to be 97% sure to even apply.
• 15:57
  So having that in your mind, you might a lot of times, and I run
• 16:01
  into it too when I try to get women in leadership.
• 16:03
  There's a first no or there's AI, don't think I have capacity
• 16:06
  and that's probably true statement.
• 16:07
  But then you keep asking and you keep asking and you keep asking
• 16:10
  and then you figure out why they don't have capacity and you get
• 16:12
  creative. And so if you really do believe
• 16:14
  in this cause, in order to. Kind of turn the tide.
• 16:18
  You need to work hard to get these women in these spots.
• 16:21
  I believe once we have more of an equitable distribution of men
• 16:26
  and women or people of color, it won't be as hard because if she
• 16:29
  can see her, she can be her. That type of framework I believe
• 16:34
  in. But I think at first it's going
• 16:36
  to take a lot of personal one-on-one conversations and
• 16:38
  work, and then it's also going to look at our systemic
• 16:41
  problems. Like why?
• 16:42
  Why would a woman not want to be an 80?
• 16:44
  OK, late nights? She's not going to want to be.
• 16:46
  I'm not blaming the woman with this by saying she's not going
• 16:49
  to be away from her family, but if that's a piece of it, we need
• 16:51
  to address it. You know, we have to get
• 16:53
  creative with childcare or things like that, or we have to
• 16:57
  realize that. You know, Megan Orgeman is the
• 17:00
  first woman president, so she's going to be surrounded by a lot
• 17:02
  of men. So please be intentional about
• 17:04
  letting her voice be heard. You know, like those types of
• 17:07
  things are subtle, but they're powerful.
• 17:09
  So wrap us up here today. We've got a clinic coming up
• 17:13
  here at the end of the month. There's a website.
• 17:15
  Tell Tell us where we can find more information and either
• 17:19
  continue on this train if we're already on it, or hop on this
• 17:21
  train because it's the right thing to do.
• 17:24
  Tell us about where we can get more information.
• 17:27
  Yeah so just like the USATFCCCA women in coaching, Wisconsin and
• 17:31
  Minnesota have a women for women coaches symposium that precedes
• 17:35
  their state clinic. So both of us are on the the day
• 17:39
  before the clinic begins. So in Minnesota we are going to
• 17:42
  be on Thursday. The I have to get this right
• 17:47
  believe I told you the dates ahead of time.
• 17:48
  So now I cleared my screen. So on Thursday, January 25th, is
• 17:53
  going to be the Minnesota Women for Women.
• 17:56
  Coaches symposium. It's the day before our clinic,
• 17:59
  our track and field clinic kicks off and what that looks like is
• 18:02
  we have we'll have a big name keynote speaker.
• 18:05
  We had Doctor Nicole Lavoie last year from the Tucker Center
• 18:08
  speak and Rachel Style who is a national speaker on eating
• 18:13
  disorders. Come speak this year, we're
• 18:15
  going to have Dorothy McIntyre. She was in the high school
• 18:17
  league when. Girls Sports came to Minnesota
• 18:19
  in 1972 and she's a pioneer. So we have a major speaker that
• 18:23
  comes. We'll listen to the speaker and
• 18:25
  then we'll do breakout sessions where we get an opportunity to
• 18:27
  talk together. Last year we had over 80
• 18:31
  participants. There was youth sports
• 18:33
  represented, college sports, coaches represented, high school
• 18:35
  coaches, sports coaches represented across.
• 18:39
  There's soccer, there's archery, there's track, there's
• 18:41
  basketball. So every sport, every level you
• 18:43
  are invited to come with us. There was men in the room.
• 18:46
  There's women in the room we want.
• 18:48
  To triple the attendance this year.
• 18:51
  So everybody is welcome to attend.
• 18:53
  It's free. It's going to be at the Saint
• 18:55
  Paul Intercontinental Hotel, really beautiful location.
• 18:59
  So it is a free event to come. It's an evening event, so it'll
• 19:03
  happen. It starts at 7:45 at night and
• 19:05
  it goes till nine PM, 9:15 PM and everybody's welcome.
• 19:09
  We're excited about the dialogue and the brainstorming and the
• 19:12
  connecting that can come from this year's session.
• 19:14
  It's our second annual, so it's still new.
• 19:16
  It's growing. Is there a either an easy to
• 19:19
  remember website and if it's not we'll put it down the show
• 19:21
  notes, but is there a website as well For more information?
• 19:25
  It's on the Minnesota High School Coaches Association
• 19:28
  website, so that is Ms. hsca.org.
• 19:33
  You click on track and field, you'll find the sport and then
• 19:36
  you will see a tab that says W4 West.
• 19:40
  And the information will be posted on there.
• 19:42
  As soon as we get all those details or those it is posted on
• 19:45
  there now actually. All right.
• 19:46
  So either use your Google skills or we'll have that website down
• 19:49
  here in the links of the show notes as well.
• 19:50
  Megan, thank you so much. I think again, I just love this
• 19:56
  quote. If she can see her, she can be
• 19:57
  here. And I think what you're doing is
• 19:59
  helping other coaches also see, Well, wait a minute, if I want
• 20:02
  to make change. It's not based on my gender that
• 20:05
  that dictates whether I can or cannot make that change.
• 20:07
  So I appreciate your leadership. Appreciate your leadership in
• 20:10
  track just in general as well as this very specific important
• 20:14
  topic here, Women for women. So thank you for joining us
• 20:16
  today and helping us learn more about this awesome program.
• 20:19
  Love it. Thank you so much.
• 20:21
  Hey, if you're out there and you're a high school coach and
• 20:23
  you want to bring it to. Your track and field program or
• 20:26
  your basketball program or your soccer program.
• 20:29
  We want this to be in every state in the United States.
• 20:31
  So come talk to me. I'll have my e-mail address also
• 20:34
  in your notes. You can contact me.
• 20:36
  Let's try to make this nationwide.
• 20:38
  That is the best idea I've heard at all.
• 20:39
  Right there. Let's spread this around.
• 20:41
  Awesome. Thanks everybody.
• 20:41
  Have a great day.