By Jessica Fargen
The Boston Herald
BOSTON — Financially strapped Bay State high schools are grappling with a blizzard of sports safety regulations and litigation at a time when many don’t have money for new teachers, let alone CPR training and athletic trainers, school officials say.
“It’s an incredible challenge,” said Barry Haley, president of the Massachusetts Interscholastic Athletic Association and athletic director at Concord Carlisle High School. “There’s no education training monies available for coaches other than what an athletic director can spare out of his budget. The days of having the ambulance sitting beside your field are gone.”
Stress on safety
The pressures to keep student athletes safe include:
- A new state law requiring parents, students and coaches to go through a head injury safety program.
- A requirement by the MIAA that all 374 member high schools have a medical professional at every hockey and football game.
- A mandate that all MIAA coaches — volunteer and paid — must complete a training course that teaches how to administer first aid, recognize steroid use and hold safe practices.
“Things that we ask of coaches now — there’s a lot more paperwork, they are collecting fees and physical (forms),” said Dan Thornton, assistant principal and athletic director at Pentucket Regional High in West Newbury, where last year a hockey player was injured at the end of practice and died.
Of the 218,000 Bay State high-schoolers who play sports each year, only one or two are paralyzed or killed in a practice or game in any given year. But when accidents happen, some parents look to courthouses for answers.
A landmark suit?
“I was sending my son to school thinking he was in a better place, a second home where people are going to be responsible for taking care of what they are supposed to,” recalled Sonia N. Gonzalez, 38, whose son, George S. Cruz, collapsed after playing basketball at a Springfield high school in 2008. He died at the hospital.
Earlier this month, Gonzalez filed a letter of presentment notifying the city she plans to file a $3 million lawsuit. The suit charges the school violated its own policy by failing to have any CPR-trained staff present the night Cruz collapsed.
Thomas Walsh, a spokesman for Springfield Mayor Domenic Sarno, referred comment to the city solicitor, who did not return calls.
A new policy is in place this fall in Springfield that requires all highschool coaches to be CPR-certified.
Damages against municipalities are capped at $100,000 under state law. But in a move that, if successful, could expose cities to significant financial peril, Gonzalez’s lawyer, Max Borten of Waltham, argues that multiple officials could be held liable.
“This hits the heart of every person who has a teenager practicing sports,” Borten said.
Schools should be prepared for lawsuits, given the increasing number of student-athlete injuries, said David E. Frank, a lawyer and reporter for Massachusetts Lawyers Weekly.
“From a legal perspective, schools are on notice that these kinds of situations can happen and that schools are going to have to take steps to at least be prepared to properly respond when they occur,” he said.
Coaches under pressure
The heaviest burden of new regulations falls on the heads of the men and women leading teams on playing fields and in school gyms.
“It’s a much more difficult job than ever because of all the responsibilities a coach has,” said Haley, the MIAA president.
Donna Andersen took over last year as athletic director at Triton Regional High in Byfield and has required all 22 coaches to get certified in CPR.
“Coaches now start to realize there may be situations we really need to step into and not pass it on to someone else, but be the hands-on person,” Andersen said. She also requires an athletic trainer to stay until the last practice every night and carry an Automated External Defibrillator at all times.
Byfield is one of the more fortunate districts: Only about one-third of Massachusetts high schools have athletic trainers, leaving the responsibility to coaches, said Dr. Lyle Micheli, director of sports medicine at Children’s Hospital.
“With today’s budgets, the athletic department budgets have been drastically cut throughout the state. You rarely see a dedicated athletic director at every high school today,” said Dave Fudge, dad of three high school soccer players and president of the Pentucket Athletic Association.
And the rules to keep students safe keep getting stricter.
In April, the National Federation of State High School Associations changed its rulebook to advise that no athlete return to play or practice the same day as suffering a concussion. Previously, players could return to play if symptoms resolved within 15 minutes.
Legislation that would require all coaches to be certified in CPR and in the use of defibrillators is pending at the State House. It is not backed by the MIAA because the organization believes it would be hard to enforce and could discourage volunteers, said MIAA spokesman Paul Wetzel.
Schools try their best, given limited resources, “with the safety of kids as our first priority,” Haley said. “It’s about all you can do.”
Copyright 2010 Boston Herald Inc.