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On Tuesday, September 26, President Kyle Farmbry received an email letter from Jeannie
Franklin, a Virginia State University alumnae and an individual who attended the Virginia State
versus Guilford women’s soccer match held at Appenzeller Field earlier that evening. In the
letter, Jeannie shared her concerns regarding the “hostile and racist climate” she experienced at
the game.
During the Cabinet meeting the next morning (Wednesday, September 27) Kyle asked Bill Foti,
Director of Athletics, and Steve Mencarini, Dean of Students, to spearhead the investigation of
the incident.
Between 10am and 8pm on Wednesday, September 27th, Bill and/or Steve spoke with 30
athletics staff members, non-athletics staff members, students, and parents who were at the
game.
Assistant Athletics Director and senior women’s administrator Emily Gann reviewed the video
broadcast of the game to ascertain what audio was picked up by the microphone - the quality of
the audio recording was fairly good and conversations and comments could be heard clearly.
One video was provided by a student photographer/videographer of the student section in
question. One photo was provided by a Marketing staff member.
Based on all of these conversations and review of the video/photo, this is the information that
Bill and Steve have determined:
- The heckling was primarily from a group of 14 individuals who were seated in the
bleachers to the left side of the stands.
- This particular women’s soccer game exhibited rowdier crowd behavior than previous
women’s soccer games.
- The banter directed toward the VSU players primarily occurred in the second half and
got more heated toward the end of the second half.
- We could not identify any individual who directed a racial slur towards the VSU players
through the video broadcast of the game nor the student, staff, and parent interviews.
One student indicated that he heard a group of Black/African American students using
the “n” word amongst themselves, but that the word was not directed toward any
particular VSU player.
- There was cursing coming from the student section, but no one said the cursing was
directed toward a VSU player.
- There is one comment that was said that several students said was “out of line.” Steve
and Bill could not identify what was specifically said. However, those who mentioned the
“out of line” comment said that they corrected the individual and told them to “knock it
off.”
- There is one comment that was directed to a VSU player. Public Safety addressed that
comment because it was directed at a particular player. This may have been the above
comment that was “out of line” but this can not be verified.
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- One student heard the allegation about monkey noises through a Facebook post he had
read. He shared that there were no monkey noises from the student section. The audio
recording also does not provide verification of any animal noises made in the crowd.
- Various loud statements were directed from the student section toward the field that
demonstrated poor sportsmanship:
- “Scoreboard”
- “You suck”
- “Your ankles got broken”
- “That’s a foul”
- “She won’t make a difference” (when VSU subbed in a player)
- “They’ve got water over there if you need it”
- “Gatorade” (reference to a sports video game that shows the Gatorade bottle
image if there is a tired player)
- “Nah, nah, nah, nah, hey, hey, hey, goodbye”
- “Weight room”
- “Go back to Virginia”
- “Get the bus ready”
Conclusion:
● There was poor sportsmanship shown by this group of students during the women’s
soccer game.
● We could not verify that any racial epithets nor monkey noises were directed at VSU
players from the students, staff, and parents present at the game.
● The Public Safety officer attempted to address the group of students and was
unsuccessful in getting their behavior redirected.
● The Game Manager should have been a more active participant in managing the crowd.
Action Items for game management of athletic contests:
● We are again having a training session for all game managers. (DONE)
● We are clarifying the roles for game managers and P Safe officers in attendance.
(DONE)
● We are increasing the frequency of our PA announcements on crowd behavior
expectations. (DONE)
● In those PA announcements, we are identifying our game manager by name and
encouraging all attendees to contact P Safe or a game manager if our crowd
expectations are not being met. There will be a reminder to Guilford students in
attendance that they are expected to abide by the College’s Code of Community
Responsibility while attending athletic events. (DONE)
● We are scheduling additional Sho Pro security for soccer contests going forward.
● We are posting signs at all entrances detailing our expectations for crowd behavior.
(DONE).
● We will utilize surveillance cameras directed at the stands. (DONE)
Next steps
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● A separate report will be written and submitted for review against our student code of
conduct. We anticipate judicial conversations will be held with three students.
● Bill talked to an entire team at 3:15pm on Thursday, Sept. 28 as several students in the
student section were student athletes from a sports team (DONE).
● One student-athlete has been suspended for their next contest for violating our conduct
expectations for student-athletes attending contests (DONE).