Creating Awareness Around Abuse and Misconduct Reporting

Organized sports have an enormous impact on young people’s lives. From physical benefits to mental, emotional and even academic, the positive outcomes are undeniable. Most of us think back on our time as a youth athlete fondly. We think of the lasting friendships we made, the confidence we gained, and the supportive communities that shaped us. As we support athletes on their journey through sports, it’s also important to start having conversations surrounding what a healthy and safe sports experience should look like to them.

Just as coaches and athletic trainers remain compliant via educational requirements and report injuries via incident reports, it’s equally important to recognize, document and report misconduct allegations. We’re all working together to ignite culture change and create a safe environment for all athletes by creating awareness around abuse and misconduct. 

Check out these three easy to follow steps for reporting misconduct:

1. The first step is to recognize the various forms of abuse and misconduct and what they can look like in a sports setting. 
   • The US SafeSports offers fantastic training resources for coaches, parents and athletes.
2. The next step is to document the incident properly. 
   • Electronic platforms like InjureFree offer easily accessible incident reports to help coaches and organizations document, track and reference incidents. 
3. Finally, understand how to report the incident so as to address and stop the misconduct entirely. 
   • InjureFree provides a safe space to report abuse or misconduct here. Appropriate personnel will reach out as soon as possible.

Check out more info from the US Center for SafeSport here to learn more about creating a safe sport environment.

References

1. https://www.injurefree.com/
2. https://grayinvestigativegroup.com/about-us/
3. https://uscenterforsafesport.org/