Boys try to join girls' teams following human-rights ruling
Last Updated: Tuesday, September 26, 2006 | 10:28 AM CT
CBC News
As two Winnipeg sisters find out Tuesday if they've made the boys' hockey team at their high school, their recent human-rights victory has spurred boys to try out for girls' sports teams.
Morris Glimcher, executive director of the Manitoba High Schools Athletic Association, said Tuesday that several requests from boys wanting to play on girls' teams started coming shortly after the ruling was handed down on Friday.
"We've had five requests already from boys saying: 'In the past, we haven't been eligible. But my school doesn't have a boys' team and we have a girls' team and we'd like to play,' " Glimcher said Tuesday.
"Now that the rule has come down, I guess what they're saying [is] if it's gender equity, then let's make it gender equity. And that's the general theme of the calls that I've been getting."
Glimcher said the five requests came from boys who want to play on girls' volleyball, basketball, curling and fastball teams. He said all of the requests so far have been serious requests from boys or their coaches.
'If we get four guys or five guys going out for the [girls'] basketball team, there's four or five females that won't make the team.'-Morris Glimcher
He described one call "from one young fellow who [was] just very honest, and he said: 'You know what? We're not good enough to make the varsity basketball team. But the girls' basketball … have a smaller ball and we think we could make that team.'
"He said, 'I don't know if we would start but we just love basketball and want to play and we think we could make the girls' team,' " Glimcher said.
On Friday, independent adjudicator Lynne Harrison ruled that twin sisters Amy and Jesse Pasternak, 17, suffered sex discrimination from an MHSAA policy that denied them the opportunity in 2004 to try out for the senior boys' hockey team at West Kildonan Collegiate.
The Pasternak sisters have played hockey since childhood and have been on boys' minor hockey teams outside school before.
The MHSAA's policy required athletes to play on teams of their own gender if teams for both genders exist at a school. In her decision, Harrison said that policy was discriminatory and could not be justified.
Harrison ordered the MHSAA to lift the policy in question, as well as compensate the girls $3,500 each in damages and provide them with coaching to help them prepare for tryouts this month.
The Pasternaks should find out Tuesday if they have indeed made the boys' team.
Glimcher said the requests from boys will be refused until the association holds its next board meeting, likely on Oct. 12. At that time, the organization will review the ruling and consult legal counsel on whether to appeal.
"I say up until now, our rules are going to remain status quo in that they're not eligible," he said.
With the exception of the Pasternaks, Glimcher said the association is waiting until its board meeting to discuss how it will handle cases of other girls wanting to join boys' teams.
"We have to see as a board what we want to do. Our big concern is how this whole thing could affect female participation in sport," he said.
"If we get four guys or five guys going out for the [girls'] basketball team, there's four or five females that won't make the team — and I dare say a bunch of other ones aren't going to compete — and we could end up with some female teams being made up of mostly men.
"We worked very, very hard to promote and build up female participation in sports," Glimcher added.
"Everything that our organization has done … is based gender-equal. And if we all of a sudden get an influx of males participating, it could affect female participation and that would be a travesty."
