Women’s Athletics at Dartmouth are proudly presented by Ledyard National Bank
By: Justin Lafleur
Lauren Greenberg '93 and Erika Beisler '93 just wanted to play softball.
That desire led to creating change that has made a difference in the lives of many generations… an impact that is still felt today.
Their efforts led to the creation of a varsity softball team at Dartmouth. It took plenty of perseverance, which set the foundation for where Big Green softball (and in many ways, Dartmouth Athletics as a whole) is today.
Flash forward more than two decades from their playing days, and the impact truly struck Greenberg and Beisler when they returned to campus in 2019 for a celebration of the 25th anniversary of the softball program.
"When Lauren and I were invited back to speak at the dinner, that was when I felt the full impact of what had happened," said Beisler.
The intentions of both were always to make Dartmouth a better place.
"But, it sometimes felt like we were perceived as troublemakers or nuisances," said Beisler. "The intentions of our efforts didn't always feel recognized in a positive way by the college. Being invited back made it clear this was no longer the case.
"I'll never forget the reception we got when we told our story at that dinner, the warmth in the room and how people came up to us afterwards with thanks and support," she continued. "It took me a little while to get my head around it. I think after all those years, I was a bit surprised and actually very grateful."
"That was the moment when I came to terms with the scale of change that had been achieved."
What they achieved was remarkable for anyone, never mind full-time collegiate student-athletes.
Here's their story.
Background
When Greenberg and Beisler came to Dartmouth in 1989, there was no softball team at all – not even a club team.
"Erika and I just wanted to play softball, something we both had played growing up, and were surprised to learn it wasn't an offering at Dartmouth when we started," said Greenberg.
"We didn't go into the effort thinking this is a big women's rights issue. We just wanted to play."
Beisler met with the club advisor about re-starting the club softball team (that was previously established) and posted signs across campus scheduling an initial meeting to gauge interest. Good turnout indicated there was enough interest to start a club team.
That's also when Beisler and Greenberg met for the first time.
1990 Dartmouth Softball Team
Over the ensuing four years, Greenberg and Beisler did everything a softball team needed to play – scheduling their own games, working with athletics directors and coaches at other schools, fundraising, buying equipment and uniforms, maintaining equipment, washing uniforms, training in the offseason, running practice drills in season, hiring umpires, preparing team lineups, recruiting other players within the school, playing on the team and ultimately hiring a coach.
Greenberg and another player even took the van course to become licensed to drive the team, since all of the games were on the road, at least in the first couple years. While it was a gradual process, all of this happened while the team was a club sport.
Keep in mind, they started this effort when they were freshmen in college. So, it became understandably consuming. Over time, it became clear that they were undertaking something bigger than they had imagined.
"We started organizing out of passion for the game, then felt a growing sense of unfairness, and only after two years, recognized it as discrimination," said Beisler.
Through Beisler's Women's Studies class, they learned about Title IX.
"We did a lot of research," she said. "Talking with professors, reading articles and reviewing cases at other schools convinced us that we had a case."
As sophomores, Greenberg and Beisler built on what was accomplished the year prior. There was even more interest by Dartmouth women in playing competitively in the established softball Ivy League. Beisler and Greenberg worked with the college to seek additional support to establish a varsity team by fundraising on their own and demonstrating sustained interest in playing.
Around this time is when inequities became apparent.
One example was the use of indoor facilities when the weather became colder. As a club team, softball negotiated for space and times not allocated to the 35 varsity teams, most often practicing at 10 p.m. or 6 a.m. two or three times per week.
"Because of the odd hours, the fieldhouse lights, which were on a timer, would sometimes be turned off or would turn off in the middle of practice, leaving us in the dark," said Beisler.
Several other times, the doors were locked and they'd have to wait in the snow for a college employee to let them in.
"If we couldn't find help in the off-hours, we cancelled practice," said Beisler. "Occasionally, we found varsity teams practicing in our time slots."
Greenberg and Beisler began voicing concerns in different ways and mediums, with Greenberg wanting to push forward in a more aggressive way and Beisler taking a more concerted, methodical approach.
"We complemented each other very well," said Greenberg. "We are both very assertive people. We had a goal that we wanted to achieve, but we definitely approached it differently. We have different strengths in that regard and I believe it was a good balance.
"I was pushing to file something against the school a lot sooner and Erika was more measured, wanting to work through the process with the administration and give them real opportunity to address the inequality before going outside the college."
What Greenberg is referring to is a Title IX complaint with the Department of Education, Office of Civil Rights. While they realized by sophomore year that the softball team's fate was heading down a possible path of filing a formal complaint, they wanted to – and gave – every opportunity for the issue to be resolved internally before it got to that point.
They regularly met with the administration and did their part to satisfy its standards to establish a varsity team. A Gender Equity Committee was formed in 1992 to evaluate the athletics department's compliance with Title IX. There was progress made and steps taken over time, but there were also roadblocks.
Change seemed to be happening, but slowly. In their junior year, the college requested a three-year transition proposal, agreed to increase the club budget significantly, and allowed the team to hire its first coach. However, the commitment to that proposal was immediately set aside indefinitely.
Greenberg and Beisler weren't convinced what they were doing was working.
"I recall meeting with the club athletics advisor, who we really felt was an ally in trying to help us get a team established," said Greenberg. "This meeting was around the time we had the epiphany that this was discrimination and we had a name for it. We mentioned discrimination to him and he said, even if we were right, we still might not get a softball team.
"We said no, if we're right, we should get a team," Greenberg continued. "He said no, you might get the baseball team cut. Do you two want to be responsible for getting the baseball team cut?"
This was a pivotal moment.
"We had been meeting with this advisor in the athletics department regularly and did not realize he was not on board with our goals at all," said Greenberg. "It really was eye-opening."
The spring of their senior year was when Greenberg and Beisler decided to move forward with the complaint after their meeting with the trustees showed their annual requests for a budget to establish, and fund a varsity team, had not been conveyed to the trustees by the college as promised.
"We were told we weren't going to be able to get any sort of further feedback until the trustees met, which was going to be in June," said Beisler. "At that point, we would have graduated. Honestly, we got this feeling like they were just trying to wait us out after four years."
Filing The Complaint
On April 12, 1993, on behalf of the Dartmouth softball team, Greenberg and Beisler filed a 20-page complaint with an accompanying one-inch stack of attachments with the Department of Education.
"In hindsight, I believe Erika's [methodical and measured] approach was better because as a result, we were building our case which we ultimately presented," said Greenberg. "If we had done it earlier, which I wanted to do, I don't think we would have had enough evidence and it might not have succeeded."
At the conclusion of the yearlong investigation, Greenberg and Beisler received a letter from the Department of Education advising that the complaint should be closed because the college had taken actions to resolve the allegations in the complaint.
Two of those actions were establishing varsity softball and making volleyball a fully-funded program.
That led to opportunities for student-athletes for years to come, and the softball team has gone on to win three Ivy League titles.
2014 Ivy League Champion Dartmouth Big Green
"It was fantastic to see the program take off the way it did," said Beisler. "However, having graduated, I felt removed from it, and our involvement was no longer needed. I was definitely watching from a distance. The 25th anniversary celebration really brought it home for me – going to games, meeting the coaches as well as current players and their families, talking with alumni and of course, the reception when we spoke. It pulled me back in.
"I understand the story continues to be shared, even though the anniversary celebration was three years ago," Beisler continued. "Lauren and I recently were contacted by a high school senior, who was doing a podcast on women's sports and Title IX. She had heard the story from a freshman recruit for the Dartmouth softball team because the coach had shared it.
"That floored me."
Not Doing It Alone
The creation of the Dartmouth softball program is a story of perseverance of Greenberg and Beisler.
There were plenty of allies along the way.
"There was some unexpected help that we didn't anticipate, and one was with someone in the administration who gave us a copy of the athletics department budget so we could see how the funds were allocated," said Greenberg. "I did not think we would ever get our hands on that piece of information, which really broke the case wide open in terms of how the funding was disparate from the male and female enrollment numbers on campus."
They also received help from a few professors, an advisor and members of the Gender Equity Committee.
"It was unexpected, but helpful," said Greenberg. "A professor we knew sat on the Gender Equity Committee and was reaching out to us trying to reconcile what she was hearing from us with what she was hearing from the committee."
All those pieces played a significant role in the ultimate outcome.
"If we hadn't done our outreach, made our connections and been approachable – If we had been perceived as being unreasonable – I don't think we would have gotten the help," said Greenberg. "A lot of things had to align for it to all work, so while Erika and I were leading the effort, there were a lot of other people who assisted in ways to make it succeed."
A Transformational Experience
The entire experience also led to Greenberg finding a career she's passionate about as a lawyer.
"It's 100 percent because of the softball experience why I decided to become a lawyer," she said. "I graduated with a degree in sociology and cultural anthropology, so I thought I was going to do something related to people and languages, but I didn't know what that might be. The softball experience definitely shifted my focus, although I do think I've incorporated my education around understanding people and how they interact into my career."
Greenberg tells people that softball was her thesis in college.
"It was researching, writing and documenting," she said. "Aside from the complaint we wrote, we were writing to the administration regularly because we were documenting all our meetings. We were doing all different types of writing.
"It was pre-internet, so the only way we could get messaging out on a large scale was through the student newspaper, or posting signs around campus," Greenberg continued. "We were writing to the paper, trying to convince them to write articles about our team so we could try to get more interest. All those various types of communications and trying to help persuade people to support us, those were all very transferrable life skills."
Speaking of skills, as Beisler said, "Dartmouth was a place that presented us with this dilemma, this unfairness, this situation of discrimination, but it's also the same place that gave us the tools to try and fix it.
"I learned about Title IX and its implications for athletics in a Dartmouth classroom and that was critical in our push for change," she continued. "And, of course, Dartmouth brought Lauren and me together, enabled us to connect with allies in the community, and provided many of the resources we used to research for our cause."
Dartmouth has always held a special place in the hearts of Greenberg and Beisler.
"We loved Dartmouth and really enjoyed the school," said Greenberg. "We didn't like this aspect of it, but I got a great education and met a lot of wonderful people. We wanted the college to do the right thing and fix the problem, but we didn't want to harm the college. We also did not want our efforts to resolve discrimination in athletic opportunities to have negative ramifications for the college.
"We were quiet for 25-plus years about what we had done because we wanted to let the system grow – the only way the women student-athletes could have the opportunity to play softball unimpeded by anyone else," she continued. "I think that's an important message. We did all this to address a wrong that needed to be fixed, but we also were straddling a line.
"We wanted to have it fixed, but in a way that would allow subsequent women student-athletes the opportunity to thrive. We believed that negative publicity might thwart that opportunity."
Three Ivy League titles (for softball) later and plenty of opportunities, that has certainly happened.
And it all started from just wanting to play softball.
