Safer Sport for Kids Starts with Educated, Knowledgeable Parents and Guardians

Father helping his son prepare for hockey training

Whether your child plays hockey or does gymnastics, athlete safety is often on the minds of parents. Between organizing carpools and double checking the practice schedule, it’s not uncommon to find yourself asking questions such as, “Does my child have the proper safety gear—like a mouthguard or a helmet—to avoid injury?”

But it’s important to remember that athlete safety goes beyond physical safety. It also encompasses a sport experience free from misconduct and abuse.

Steps Parents Can Take

Equipping your child with the necessary gear to skate onto the ice is often as simple as checking off a pre-season equipment list. But it’s a little more challenging to equip yourself with the knowledge to understand and address abuse, especially within the context of your child’s specific sport. And if you have multiple kids playing multiple sports, you’re up against an even tougher challenge.

The first step is education. Understanding what abuse in sport is can help you stay aware, allowing you to set your child up for a safer, more successful athletic season.

Below, we’ve listed three types of abuse and misconduct that can occur. Through our easy-to-understand definitions and sport-related examples, you’ll feel more confident in your understanding of abuse, and you’ll know what to look out for.

Three Examples of Misconduct in Sport

  1. Physical Misconduct: An athlete loses their temper and punches an opposing player after the game.
  2. Emotional Misconduct: A coach excludes an injured player from all team activities, including the end-of-season party.
  3. Sexual Misconduct: An athlete taunts another athlete about their gender identity.

Physical Misconduct

Sports are inherently physical. Kids practice challenging skills, they explore the limits of endurance, and they perfect performance. While playing sports may carry some risk of physical injury, coaches and other adult leaders have a responsibility to minimize those risks, while fostering an environment that’s safe and respectful.

Sport is no place for physical misconduct, which is any behavior done on purpose that causes physical harm to another person.

Physical misconduct may include:

  1. Contact acts, like punching or slapping an athlete. This can also include letting an athlete return to play without medical clearance after a serious injury.
  2. Non-contact acts, such as denying a player water or food, giving them alcohol or drugs, or forcing athletes to hold a painful position for no athletic reason.

What’s an example of this in sport?

A coach throws sport equipment at a youth athlete after they make a mistake.

Emotional Misconduct

Playing and coaching sports involves emotion. Players often experience happiness after scoring a goal, and coaches sometimes feel frustrated at a missed pass. While emotion is an inherent part of the sport experience, that doesn’t mean coaches, other adult leaders, or teammates should act inappropriately, creating an unsafe emotional environment for others.

Sport is no place for emotional misconduct, which is any conduct that causes emotional harm, whether or not the person meant to cause harm.

Emotional misconduct may include:

  1. Verbal acts, such as name-calling, body-shaming, or ridiculing an athlete.
  2. Physical acts, such as throwing equipment at someone or punching walls near them.
  3. Acts that deny attention or support, such as ignoring or isolating an athlete for long periods of time or routinely excluding them from activities.
  4. Stalking, such as following, monitoring, observing, threatening, or excessively messaging a child through technology.

What’s an example of this in sport?

A coach repeatedly shames or humiliates a youth athlete for how they performed.

Sexual Misconduct

The coach-athlete relationship is complex. Coaches are often in a position of power and authority, sometimes over athletes who are much younger. When this difference in power is exploited, athletes are at a greater risk of experiencing misconduct or abuse. Many forms of abuse, including emotional, physical, and sexual abuse, often occur when there’s an imbalance or misuse of power.

Sport is no place for sexual misconduct, which includes a wide range of sexual actions that are done without consent, most often by an older adult or youth to a child.

What are examples of this in sport?

  1. An athlete records teammates changing in the locker room without their consent.
  2. An athlete frequently makes fun of a nonbinary athlete’s pronouns, haircut, and clothing.
  3. An assistant coach purposefully finds ways to inappropriately touch youth athletes.
  4. A teammate repeatedly teases another youth athlete about the shape or weight of their body.
  5. A coach makes several negative comments about women and girls that reinforce sexual stereotypes.

Key Takeaways

Parents and guardians are in an ideal position to be a source of strength and empowerment for youth athletes. With helpful tools and resources on hand, you can feel confident in your ability to understand the warning signs of abuse and how to respond to keep your child safe.

For more information about abuse in sport and sport-related examples of misconduct, explore our Parent and Guardian’s Handbook for Safer Sport, take our free Parent’s Guide to Misconduct in Sport online training, or visit our webpage for parents.