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Howard women’s rugby club founders seek resources as graduation nears
In its fourth year, the team still grapples with limited funding, little access to areas for practices and matches
As the founding members of Howard University’s women’s rugby club prepare to graduate in May, the seniors hope to leave the players who come after them with more resources.
In 2023, the club team became the first from a historically Black college or university to compete in the College Rugby Association of America Division II women’s national championship game. The team finished in second place, despite grappling all season with a lack of funding and limited access to safe practice spaces – issues they are still facing as this year’s playoffs begin.
Because the group is considered a club team at Howard, without an official title under the university’s athletic department, the team has not been given a practice space on campus, transportation to off-site practice facilities or athletic department funding. Any funding the club receives from the university comes from Howard’s Division of Student Affairs. With the help of one of their sponsors, Voice in Sport, an advocacy group for women in sports, the club team has been lobbying the administration for more resources.
Kyle Helson
“Because of our successes and where we’re trying to go, I think if the administration uses that same seriousness it has for other sports for our sport and realizes that it’s not just for fun, that’ll help make everyone else realize that this is real,” co-head coach Leandria Ates told Andscape. “And with that, I think everyone will start to respect us as well.”
In response to questions from Andscape, Monica Lewis, Howard’s assistant vice president of strategic communications, provided the following statement:
“Howard University is committed to ensuring that all student-athletes have a rewarding and enriching experience during their matriculation. We are extremely proud of the many accomplishments our Athletics program has made in recent years but especially pleased to see the growth and success of team sports where students of color – especially women – have traditionally been underrepresented, including golf, swimming, tennis, volleyball, soccer and softball.
“Students who have excelled in those sports during their youth clearly see that opportunities to pursue their athletic endeavors on the collegiate level exist here, and we will continue to work towards providing students with interests in other sports ample opportunities to compete, through additional collegiate teams where feasible or through our robust intramurals program that is available to all students enrolled at the university.”
The club was formed in 2020. Due to the coronavirus pandemic, in-person activities didn’t begin until fall 2021.
At the time, members were required to pay for their uniforms and player dues.
“It’s kind of hard to ask people to spend their own money and then to play in their free time when they really don’t have to, because we aren’t giving out scholarships or anything,” chief financial officer and founding member Gabby Mays said. “We’re simply playing because we want to.”
By Year Two, the club team managed to gain partnerships and sponsors, including former rugby player Paul Sheehy, the owner of Sheehy Auto Stores and a former pro rugby player; Old Glory D.C., a pro rugby team Sheehy co-founded in the Washington metropolitan area; and Young Glory, a nonprofit focused on helping local rugby initiatives. The sponsors took over paying for all uniform costs, and Mays hopes the team eventually will become fully functioning with no cost to players.
Caleb Moore
Through the D.C. Department of Parks and Recreation, the club team books practice areas as close to Howard’s main campus as possible. Since a shuttle isn’t readily available to them, unless an away game is scheduled, members carpool to practice and often are forced to miss it altogether.
On more than one occasion, club team members have heard gunshots during practice.
“I don’t want them [team members] to worry about silly things like having money for gas to get people to and from practice, shootings at practice, or any of these ridiculous things,” team president and co-founder Takunda Rusike said.
As a club team, the players also don’t have any rights to Howard’s Greene Stadium, which has left them susceptible to double bookings in the past. However, this season, the team has been able to hold home games at the stadium more regularly.
The U.S. Department of Education’s Equity in Athletics Data Analysis provides statistics for the intramural sports at Howard. According to the analysis, as of June 2023, women made up nearly 73% of Howard’s undergraduate population. Of the university’s 9,019 undergraduates, 6,570 were female and 2,449 were male.
The data also shows Howard women’s teams award less athletically-related student aid than their male counterparts. The men’s teams awarded $5,381,237 and the women’s teams awarded $4,457,881. Men’s teams also had higher recruiting expenses, which totaled $61,590, and the women’s teams’ corresponding expenses totaled $32,170.
In early February, players went to Capitol Hill, where Rusike spoke in support of Title IX, the landmark gender equity legislation of 1972, and the Fair Play For Women Act, which seeks to strengthen Title IX by further addressing gender discrimination in sports.
“I think as Black women, it was very important for us to be there [on Capitol Hill], especially because we play a majority white sport, and then also being at Howard, a majority women school,” said Chenelle Cates, a founding member of the rugby club. “And seeing the women’s sports teams not have equal play or equal funding compared to the men’s team is absolutely crazy.”
In 2023, Champion Women, an advocacy group for women in sports, filed an administrative class complaint on behalf of the women’s club and intramural sports at Howard against former university president Wayne A.I. Frederick and current director of athletics Kery Davis, alleging “unequal athletic participation opportunities, unequal athletic scholarship dollars, and unequal athletic benefits and treatment, including recruitment funding.”
It is not the first time Howard has faced a Title IX dispute. In 1993, Sanya Tyler, then coach of the women’s basketball team, was awarded $1.1 million in damages after a jury found that the university discriminated against her in not offering the same salary and resources that it gave to the men’s basketball coach.
The founding seniors of Howard’s women’s rugby club team believe they have gone through similar obstacles for their program to thrive, and they are still working to create a brighter future for their successors.
Rusike stressed the importance of the club team eventually becoming an official team at Howard, and becoming part of the NCAA and the National Intercollegiate Rugby Association.
“The ultimate goal is for us to be the first NCAA Division I [HBCU] women’s rugby team and program — that is what we’re working toward,” Rusike said. “And even in postgrad, myself and the other founding members who are seniors plan on starting the alumni association so we can continue to work through this effort to finish what we started.”