Women’s Flat Track Derby Association (WFTDA)

I am applying for The Elevate Prize to accelerate the impact of the life-saving COVID-19 Guidelines I developed with the Women’s Flat Track Derby Association (WFTDA), to promote the thought leadership of women-led systems, and to support WFTDA’s recovery across 23 countries. 

The WFTDA has had no reported cases of COVID-19 as a result of playing roller derby. Our innovative guidelines are free to implement, have gained coverage across national media, and have been downloaded by thousands of organizations. 

While this approach saved lives, halting our sport has significantly impacted revenue. Our operating budget has decreased by more than 60%, from $1.2 million to $533K, forcing us to reduce our staff by 33%, and to cut both salaries and hours for those remaining. 

The funds, exposure, and marketing support from the Elevate Prize will strengthen WFTDA’s capacity to disseminate our effective COVID guidelines, advocate for the importance of women-led sporting organizations, and bring the transformational power of roller derby to the forefront. Specifically, these funds will help create a coalition to share ideas, policy, and key learnings. WFTDA aims to develop an intentional, global community that promotes gender equity in sports.

As Executive Director of the Women’s Flat Track Derby Association (WFTDA), a 501(c)3 nonprofit and the governing body for amateur flat track roller derby, I wholeheartedly believe in our mission: to revolutionize the role of women in sport. 

I started with the WFTDA in 2007 as an announcer, and I eventually became an official, a skater, and a junior roller derby coach. Roller derby is transformational because it provides access to sport for traditionally marginalized athletes: women, nonbinary, and gender expansive participants. 

As a leader, I have created programming and policies that expand inclusion and access. An NYU Film grad, I founded the organization’s broadcast program in 2012, wftda.tv and established relationships with ESPN, BBC Sport, CBS Sports.

Since becoming Executive Director in 2017, I’ve spearheaded several significant policy changes, including a multi-year Strategic Plan, a Code of Conduct with an accompanying Tool Kit, an Injury Survey and Analysis reviewing the correlation between rules changes and injury reductions, COVID-19 Guidelines, Infection Guidelines, Audience Guidelines, and an Anti-Racism reframing, the ART Project.   

My future vision is to continue guiding our members through COVID-19 safely and to build a more equitable national and global roller derby framework.

For more than 15 years, the WFTDA has supported under-represented communities in sport as a women-led, democratically governed, and athlete-focused nonprofit.

Before the pandemic, the gap for women and nonbinary representation in sport was already enormous: Only 11% of 2016 Olympic coaching staff were women, and the IOC board includes less than 30% representation from women.

And while non-collegiate amateur athletics in the United States account for a small percentage of annual sports attendance revenue, they encompass more than 700,000 participants in 41 sports.

Amateur athletes have been particularly vulnerable during the pandemic, without resources like those available to professional sports organizations. Nevertheless, our COVID-19 Guidelines have not resulted in any COVID illness, while almost every professional sport has had an outbreak. 

The WFTDA’s guidelines are being used by our 40,000 global participants, 87% of whom are women and nonbinary. Beyond roller derby, our guidelines would benefit the more than 700,000 amateur athletes in the U.S. alone, and their application is not limited to sport, as evidenced by the more than 1,000 organizations who have download them, including Yale Repertory Theatre, the American Medical Society for Sports Medicine, Harvard University, Hawaiian Airlines, and JP Morgan.

To return to sport safely, we created a free tool that focuses on infection prevention and allows clubs to calculate their target COVID infection rates based on available information. 

I convened a team of expert volunteers from the roller derby community, including a Fellow of the Association for Professionals in Infection Control and Epidemiology, doctors, nurses, public health and infectious disease specialists. Together, we created a formula for clubs to calculate readiness using the CDC-recommended 50 in 100,000 cases over 14 days. This is the basis for our Return-to-Play ladder, which is safely guiding leagues now and during 2020 and was featured in numerous media outlets, including Wired Magazine, Full Frontal with Samantha Bee, and New York Daily News. 

In addition to our COVID guidelines, the WFTDA’s athlete-driven, innovative, and community-forward model provides a framework to advance important Anti-Racism, trans-inclusive, and accessibility conversations in sport leadership. 

We have taken the lead in discussing the rights of transgender women in sport, pushing back on media outlets or policy-makers who marginalize or other. Our gender statement is among the most inclusive in global sports and has been profiled several times, most notably in 2015 with ESPNW.

Because we are guided by women, nonbinary, and gender-expansive leadership, the WFTDA community understands what it is like to be excluded, and we are committed to building a future where anyone who wants to play our sport is safe. 

By putting the community first in a way that no other sport has, the WFTDA has controlled the spread of COVID-19. Our refusal to contribute to cases has resulted in significant harm reduction in 450 communities across 23 countries where we play. 

Conversely, across six major league sports in the United States--MLB, NFL, NBA, WNBA, NHL, and MLS--789 athletes tested positive in 2020, despite measures like segregated bubbles and daily testing. 

More than 30% of WFTDA clubs, most outside of the United States, were able to safely attempt a return in the past year, with members successfully stepping off the ladder during infection spikes. In this way, we did what few other sports have been able to do: Prevent COVID-19.

But our COVID policy is not our only impact on humanity. Our disruptive and inclusive gender policy has created and held space for trans women and nonbinary athletes at a time when their rights and protections are under attack.