The New Prague School District loves to credit itself for its attention to treating everyone equally. And there’s no reason to believe the district is sincere with its claim equity matters.
But in a recent case, its attention to the notion of treating everyone equally missed the mark. Badly.
The district recently hired Michael Schmidt as its new director of activities. He’ll replace Brad Skogerboe, a man who is resigning after 18 years in New Prague. He leaves a huge set of shoes to fill and a legacy of caring deeply for New Prague’s students and their activities. There is no reason to believe Schmidt will do anything but outstanding work filling those big shoes. We hope he is successful in every imaginable way and enjoys a long, storied career at NPHS.
But this is not about him.
The process for hiring Schmidt fell short when it came to equal representation. A committee interviewed Schmidt and the other unnamed finalists for the job. The committee included, among other people, coaches. Those coaches represented the football team, the boys’ ice hockey team and the wrestling team. On its face, that might seem like girls’ athletic teams were completely ignored. Sadly, they were although Superintendent Andy Vollmuth said there are girls’ on the wrestling team. Five girls, we’re told. That’s it. Five.
The online list of rosters the district maintains on its web site doesn’t include either group of wrestlers, boys or girls. It doesn’t include the track and field teams, either. The spring sports team photos we published earlier this spring indicates there are dozens of girls on the track and field team. There are 18 girls on the varsity basketball team, 18 on the gymnastics team and 26 girls on the varsity dance team, 23 on the swimming team and a dozen on the girls’ tennis team. There are about 70 football players on the varsity football roster and 34 on the varsity boys’ ice hockey roster. The wrestling team roster is not included on the district’s activities online web page.
When we asked about the dearth of girls’ sports representation, the answer suggested an inadvertent, honest oversight. People, including newspaper reporters and editors, make mistakes. It happens. Nobody sits down and plans to make a mistake. When we were informed of an error, we point out our mistake and correct it in a high-value location. But what is more concerning is nobody caught the inadvertent oversight and suggested an adjustment. We’re told even the most senior girls’ coaches were not even asked to serve on the committee. Instead, the high-profile coaches of boys’ sports were asked to serve. There are several coaches of girls’ teams with long, distinguished careers. Privately, coaches of girls’ teams noticed the oversight and were disappointed over the exclusion. If they brought the lack of representation to the attention of the administration beforehand, the oversight was not corrected.
But this is also a school district that publicly states its perpetual belief in the importance of equity. And so far, it seems no public recognition has been offered the ball was dropped when it came to representation of girls’ sports. There has been no public discussion about the hiring process among the school board.
Girls’ sports are important, just as important as boys’ sports and the fine arts. New Prague does an outstanding job with its activities, sports and the fine arts alike. The community can and should be proud of its young people and their talents on the stage, the choir room, the band rehearsal room, the art room and the field of competition. Girls’ sports are important. They foster self-confidence and leadership.
There is no proof including a girls’ coach on the committee would have resulted in anyone else being named the new activities director. The activities director is a highvisibility person. It’s an important position. Since equity matters, hopefully, this situation will be a learning experience not soon forgotten.