BodiMojo Blog

One only had to see the first installment of Bob Holher’s seven-part series in the Boston Globe, Failing Our Athletes, the Sad State of Sports In Boston Public Schools, juxtaposed with the insert on the All Scholastics, Spring 2009, to feel one’s heart sink.  The image on the front page of the Globe (June 21, 2009), showing several city baseball players, all minorities, practicing in a concrete alleyway was in startling contrast to the smiling faces of Norwell’s girls’ lacrosse team, winner of Division 2 state championship – a jubilant group of white, pony-tailed girls holding up peace fingers to the camera. Could the disparities among the state’s athletic teams been portrayed as any wider?  It might be something you’d miss if you get the Globe online.  I cut out the two images and have been uncomfortable looking at them all week. I would hope the rest of Massachusetts’s residents – especially parents – might feel the same. It could drive people into action.

The rest of the exposé on Boston athletics was similarly unsettling, sometimes shocking, clearly maddening when thinking of the city and state’s failure to address a problem that was identified over 16 years ago.  It is an issue that become so neglected over time and sadly shunted to the lowest budget priority. The problems are systemic: lack of money, no equipment, under staffing, poor coaching, no feeder teams, disenfranchised communities, gang violence, inability of families to financial support athletics, kids busing it to other schools with better resources, students with poor grades resulting in ineligibility to play sports, and the list goes on.

While the series has evoked reactions  – from the mayor who is doing his own Monday morning quarterbacking by starting a foundation to address the issue of a broken and ailing sports program to rallying cries by the mayoral candidates (flinging blame but promising to do better) – there seems to be hope.  And that comes from the tentative but diplomatic response of our three great professional teams: the Bruins, Celtics, and Red Sox.  They seem to be saying, according to the seventh installment (City Seeks Heroes, June 27), make a plan and we’ll come to the table. Ok, that’s a step.

One mayoral candidate, Kevin McCrea, was reported to say, “It’s not the job of the Red Sox to fund schools. The politicians should make sure sports and arts are funded as part of what makes a civic society.”  Of course it is the job of the Red Sox and other hometown profession teams! It is also the job of the politicians, the legislators, businesses, the community, and public citizens.  It’s called social responsibility. Other cities with major sport teams are great models of what can be done to improve sports and access to sports – donating a portion of ticket sales or adding a ticket tax to support schools or providing program funds for interscholastic sports. What Red Sox fan would balk at 75 cents of every ticket going toward inner city sport programs? True, ticket prices are ridiculously high. But knowing that some if it was being funneled back to promoting health and sports among the city’s youth could easily justify the pain of getting that credit card bill. Fans want to know how their money is being spent and transparency is key when it comes to social responsibility.

So here’s the thing:  it can only help the major professional teams to help disadvantaged youth in their own city. It can only help Boston’s politicians to work together with businesses to create a sustainable plan. It also speaks to what today’s youth typically look for in brands and older generations are coming to see as attractive:  a brand with a cause or a brand supporting a cause is a brand worth buying.  This is known as the conscious brand – and each major sport’s team is a brand; each university and business is a brand; and the city of Boston is brand.  It is time to bring consciousness into our local brands – and saving our youth by way of supporting athletics – is one good way to do it.  In the end, everyone wins.

Tara Cousineau, Ph.D., is the founder of BodiMojo.com.