 Let your gang speak louder than your gender. They don't owe you a place, but when you get there, make dang sure that they know your name. This organization wants to empower girls through sports to be their best selves. We started out solely focused on the benefit of physical activity and sport for health, and we wanted to know how we might then connect sport to another outcome. That's when we endeavored to introduce STEM for the very first time. STEM in general is underrepresented, just like many sports in terms of women representation. We want to empower these girls to not only, you know, play hard and go far in sports, but also in these underrepresented areas of STEM as well. As female athletes, we need to learn. The earlier you learn it, figure it out, the better you will be on the end. Girls my age need to meet women in STEM because sometimes they might just want to learn stuff about STEM and want to do it too. They might want to do what they're doing. The idea of play like a girl is about confidence, empowerment, but then incorporating the element of play, which I think is probably most important. Got to hear from doctors. Got to hear from women in sports. She got to hear from business women. So having females in these roles now allow girls to say, I could be that person, I could be that coach, I could be that player and I think it's amazing. One day I'm gonna have a family and now that I do have a family, I have a daughter that looks up to me and I have to teach her the day you quit is the day that everybody else looks past you. STEM can open many, many opportunities for our girls and so we focus on providing for them the opportunity to see unlimited possibilities. The truth is that just because somebody else doesn't see the future for you, doesn't mean that the future isn't there for you to get. STEM opens the world to girls who many of them have never been outside of their neighborhoods. You don't have to be a professional sport or even play sports in college to gain your self confidence. I think just playing a sport, doing one of these camps, going to play like a girl programs, all those programs help you learn self confidence. Studies have shown that girls are two times more likely to drop out of sports at the age of 13 than boys and we want to shatter that number. We want girls to continue to play sports. Our hope is that as they grow in their confidence, as they learn new skills, as they learn how to, whether they're learning how to code or playing kickball or that they are growing in confidence, that they are realizing that they can do whatever it is they want to do, they can go as far as they want to go, whether they are the only girl in the room or not. I play like a girl. I play like a girl. I play like a girl. I play like a girl. Even though when you fail, that's just an opportunity to try again and like, you might fail down because you have not achieved what you was trying to go for, like that you can always try again because it's going to help you grow. Since our pilot in July, over 1,500 women volunteers from as far as Silicon Valley and the Big Apple to right here at home in Music City have signed up to mentor and support up to 500 middle school girls ages 10 to 13 through our new virtual mentoring program, Meet and Mentor. What it means to me is to have support of amazing mentors and fellow mentees. This program is awesome. We have a whole bunch of mentors from all across the U.S. that actually have joined us and we talk about really, you know, cool things like how to plan for success and we talk about how to fail as well, which is such an important skill to learn. Play like a girl for me was the start of like me coming into being who I am today and getting out of my comfort zone. When I got into the program, I believe I was in the fourth grade and I had a mentor, Sherelle, and we would do everything together. So being in play like a girl gave me the chance to have someone who I looked up to as a big sister. It started at Sting Camp and then I became an ambassador. And then like since then we've been doing a bunch of fun stuff. I went to an Ariana Grande concert with some other ambassadors. We did more virtual Sting Camp than activities. I just saw something that I felt like needed to be done and you can do it with anything that you're passionate about. Everyone just believe in themselves. I am smart. I am a leader. I am enough. I am beautiful. You are who you create. You are like ask someone who you're really close with and say, Hey, what am I struggling in? What kind of trait am I, you know, walking in and find ways to, you know, build up and learn to better yourself in those ways. You girls, all the girls will play like a girl. You girls are needed in the world. You're needed. And one day you brilliant girl will change the world. We're moving into virtual field trips. So really take this opportunity to ask questions. They're going to tell you about how cool their jobs are. You are all set and ready to give you guys all kind of a virtual experience of what their jobs are. I really like speed mentoring. Let me get to talk with all the different mentors. The thing that I like the most was talking to our mentors and sharing our issues. So do not let your negative self talk. Talk you out of your passion and what you love to do. Don't miss out on that. I'm Kayla Kirk and I'm a project engineer with Turner Construction. I would say my advice to girls would be, there's nothing you can't do. No, the worst they can ever say is no. So always ask the question. I'm Micaela Costin. I'm the project manager for the Mid-State MOB project here in Nashville, Tennessee with Turner Construction. I'm very passionate about bringing more females into this industry. We bring so much to this field with our diversity of thoughts, emotional intelligence and multitasking skills that this is a very rewarding career for any female. If you love building things with your hands, if you love having a tangible project to show off at the end of the day, construction is a great career for you. I think I'm gonna be, I think I'm gonna. So my name is Herbert Brown. I'm the Community and Citizenship Director for Turner Construction here in Nashville, Tennessee. It's just very critical for males to advocate for young women and it's really just a matter of just dreaming, working hard, being patient and not really putting any limitations to what she can do. My name is Miranda McDonald and I am the Director of Community Development for Calvert Street Group. I am proud to be a monthly donor to play like a girl because this is important to support girls while they're young and not water down their dreams. We have an opportunity to feed that flame, to encourage and endorse that strong brilliance that they need to have. Then I think that play like a girl is certainly a vehicle to make that happen. Everyone here in Washington, DC at the National Archives Museum and online. My name is Alice Camps. I'm the curator of All American, The Power of Sports, our special exhibition in the Lawrence F. O'Brien Gallery. I am delighted to be here to help open tonight's program, Girl Power, inspiring the next generation of women athletes. Our panelists will talk about experiences and inspiration in the world of women sports. A world that has changed drastically in the last 50 years. This revolution is due in no small part to Title IX, part of the Education Amendments Act of 1972, which prohibits sex-based discrimination in federally funded education programs. This landmark legislation resulted in more women in sports and more opportunities for women to compete at the college and professional level. You can see Title IX, along with other fascinating sports records in All American. It's on display here through January 7th, 2024, and it's full of fascinating artifacts that explore the government's use of sports to define and promote national identity, unite citizens, and teach American values. It also presents records related to historic athletes like Billie Jean King and Wilma Rudolph, who challenged the United States to live up to its stated goals. I invite you to visit either in person here at the museum or online at museum.archives.gov slash all-american. It's now my pleasure to introduce our partner in tonight's program, Dr. Kim, Dr. Kimberly Clay, CEO of Play It Like a Girl, a national nonprofit organization that leverages skills girls gain from sports to help prepare them for competitive, male-dominated careers in science, technology, engineering, and mathematics. And thank you all for being here. Welcome. Tonight is going to be an exciting opportunity for us to share with you what we do with and for girls all across the United States of America through Play Like a Girl. I am so thankful for the partnership and opportunity to represent Play Like a Girl as a member of the Honorary Host Committee for All-American, the Power of Sport exhibit here at the National Archives. I am equally proud to also bring programming to our nation's capital, to girls across the country, to girls across the world, because tonight we are live streaming to a global community. It is my pleasure, my honor, to team up with the National Archives, the museum, as well as the foundation, and specifically to partner with them in advancing the mission of Play Like a Girl to inspire the next generation of women athletes. Girl Power, that's the name of tonight's event. Girl Power is an extension of our mission to level the playing field for girls everywhere. To accomplish this, we harness the collective power of women volunteers and male allies to unite around their ability to actually make a difference in the gender inequity issue and problem that we face in our country and around the world. We specifically work, as mentioned before, to leverage the skills that girls gain from sport participation to help propel them into competitive male-dominated careers in the STEM fields. Why? Because we are committed to helping every girl, including you and the audience, both here in the room as well as out in the world of the internet to help you actually reach your full potential, that's our goal. So thank you for joining us both online from all over the world tonight, and for those joining us here in the theater in Washington, D.C. For those online, we'd love for you in the chat or comments box to share with us where you're joining us from. I think it'd be interesting to see where folks are represented. And everyone, including those in the theater, be sure to share the YouTube link, to share it on your social pages, encourage your audience, if not watching it live tonight, to also go back and watch it later. It will be there for you to share. But don't stop there. Let's keep the conversation going online. Please share your screenshots, your photos, your videos, and you'll get to take a lot of them with the athletes themselves tonight. Tag at I play like a girl and include the hashtag ready for any field, because that's what we are doing. We are preparing girls all over the world to be ready for any field. And when you tag at I play like a girl and hashtag ready for any field, we will be able to reshare your message and continue to amplify the message from tonight. I'm especially excited because tonight you get to hear from some remarkable play like a girl ambassadors, women who represent the spectrum of sport, women who represent sport on and off the field. Those women, those elite women athletes will share their inspiring stories and they will give some sage advice with us and to us tonight. But before they come, there's one very special young woman who actually is a member of our play like a girl program community in Nashville, which is where we call home. She traveled today, first time ever to the nation's capital all the way from Nashville at an early, early hour at about six o'clock this morning to explore Capitol Hill and to share tonight with us and our athletes. Zebo, I'd love for you to stand so that we can recognize you. Congratulations. Thank you. Zebo is one of our middle school students from Nashville. She literally just completed a six week leadership academy where she was learning about the M in STEM, mathematics, but not just the math. We also taught our girls about money because it's especially important that we began to actually make a difference towards financial literacy and economic freedom for young women in this country. And so that is part of the work that we've been doing with our partners, US Bank and Juniper Square. And so it was a great opportunity for Zebo and several of the other girls in Nashville to be mentored and taught and learn about how to manage money, how to plan for their future and how to actually outline some goals around college and career and how to go about financing it without student loans. That's our goal for our girls. This was, again, Zebo's first visit to the nation's capital. So she spent her day exploring culture, history, government and the women's movement among so many other things. So I know that she is going to have lots of stories to share tomorrow back in our classroom at Strive Colleta Academy, one of our partner schools in Nashville. So shout out to Strive and all of the students at Strive who are watching and to Principal Butler for your ongoing partnership with Play Like a Girl and for excusing Zebo from school today. So thank you and congratulations again, Zebo. To learn more about Play Like a Girl or to bring Play Like a Girl to your community, visit our website at iplaylikeagirl.org. We also offer virtual mentoring. A huge part of what we've done post pandemic is to really extend our programming such that girls all across our country can benefit from the wonderful opportunities that our partners like the NFL and LPGA and so many others are affording girls in Nashville. We want to provide those same opportunities to girls elsewhere. And so again, we've leveraged the collective power of our women volunteers and male allies all across the country in corporate and non-corporate positions on the side of sport within sports agencies and organizations, those who represent athletes, those who are athletes themselves, current and former. We have tons of partnerships and opportunities for you to actually engage and get involved with the girls directly. And if you'd like to mentor, visit our site at iplaylikeagirl.org slash mentor. And while you're there, be sure to join our email list so that you can actually stay updated on all of the late breaking happenings with Play Like a Girl. Super exciting things, just like what you will experience tonight. We do them every single week of every single year. And so with that, I will now introduce our host, our moderator and yes, another athlete. Natalie Calibut is a sports anchor, broadcaster and host who is currently doing live sports broadcast as a play-by-play announcer, color analyst and reporter for ESPN and several other sports networks. She too is an athlete, her sport, championship diving at the collegiate level. Tonight we count Natalie as a Play Like a Girl ambassador. She's going to guide the conversation from the stage but she'll also lend her voice to the Play Like a Girl rally cry as well. So if you would help me to welcome Natalie and Natalie will bring out your special guest for tonight. Please engage with us online, share the YouTube clip and again, share and tag iplaylikeagirl ready for any field, anywhere that you find us on social media, enjoy. Dr. Kimberly Clay for that wonderful introduction. I'm Natalie, a former diver turned TV broadcaster. So it feels so incredible to be here with you all. Thank you so much for having us. We're gonna cover the topic girl power inspiring the next generation of women athletes. And I know for myself and my athletic career I would not be here today if it wasn't for the sport of diving. And I know that the power of sports can bring women together and it can also provide a platform for us to be as successful as possible. So with that, I'd like to thank you all for having me here today and I'd like to bring out our star studded panel. A trailblazer in professional softball signing the first million dollar contract for the scrapyard dogs of the national pro fast pitch league, a two time Olympic silver medalist and now an author of her very own book, Rise and Shine, the Monica Abbott story. Let's please give a warm welcome to Monica Abbott. She has a BA in public policy from Stanford University where she also played basketball and an MBA from the Wharton School at the University of Pennsylvania. Following her career with the New York Liberty and the WNBA she spent some time as the NBA's associate vice president of basketball operations and is now the head of league operations for the WNBA. Please welcome Bethany Donovan. She has a degree in mechanical engineering from Dartmouth College and is a US Alpine ski racer and two time Olympian currently competing on the FIS Audi World Cup Speed Circuit. Growing up in Buffalo, New York with five siblings she had an alternative path to success to the US ski team that she will share with us later on in this program. Please welcome Patricia Trisha Mangan. All right, so before we start I would like everyone during the program to just jot down some questions. We're gonna do a Q and A at the end. So if you have any questions for any of us up here we'd love to answer them. So thank you all for being here to join our conversation. Again the topic is girl power inspiring the next generation of women athletes. So ladies, let's first start with what does it mean to be a woman in sports today? Okay I'll start. What does it mean to be a woman in sports today? I think we are at the best state ever right now to be a woman in any sport. The amount of growth that we've had because of TV but most importantly because of the social media impact that we're able to have. It's created awareness, right? It's created conversation and it's created these cool highlights. How many of you have seen like a 12 year old doing something amazing on social media right? And you can see them at 12 years old and you can see them at the pro level. So seeing that awareness, seeing it first makes you believe and creates a dream inside of you that you can do it first. Sometimes as women we need role models and people to see it first and that visibility and awareness via TV and social media is allowing our young athletes even more powerful experience to be the future. Yeah I agree. I think we're at a zenith for women's sports. One of the things that is, the talent and the quality of play has been there, right? I do think that, I mean just speaking for basketball specifically, the talent I'm glad I played when I played because I don't know about getting out there on the court with these players now because the talent's phenomenal. But I do think that it's the visibility. When you look at the women's national championship game for basketball at the college level, 9.9 million viewers because that game was broadcast on ABC and you think about that. Yeah. And the talent was ready to be displayed. So I think that it's an awesome time to be in women's sports no matter what the sport is. And I also am heartened by the fact that it is a kind of a rising tide lifts all boats. I think there's so much kind of shared vision around what can happen across all women's sports. And certainly it starts with girls wanting to play sports. So I'm really excited to be part of this event today but what an awesome time to be part of this entire ecosystem. Yes I totally agree with what Monica and Bethany said. The talent and being able to see it to believe it I think is so important. And I think also I feel very lucky that I came out of time post title nine because I think that another aspect of girls in sport is increasing the opportunity for girls to be out there and they seeing more role models. They're seeing all this inspirational in women in sport already. And there's amazing foundations I play like a girl that are working to create more opportunity. And so I'm really excited to be here. And I am also very hopeful that we can continue the wave and continue to increase girls participation in sport and that the trajectory will just keep on going up. I want you ladies to take us through how you started in your sport. How you started in skiing. How you started in basketball. How you started in softball. And what is something that you wish you knew when you first started? Well I started playing softball because well I had an older sister that wanted to play and it was easier for my parents to put us both on the same team. And easier to drive us to practice that way. It started that way. I was fortunate enough that my mom had played in a rec league in a rec softball league and we played in that same league or a subsidiary of it. And that's kind of how we started. It started as a family event. Let's get them active. Let's get them on a team sport to kind of be outside and learn in a positive environment. And then it just kind of took off. If there was one thing that I wish I had seen is kind of goes back to what I said originally is that visibility, the more information, the knowledge. When I was young, softball wasn't on TV. Women's sports wasn't really on TV. I remember the first other tall woman I saw in my area that was over six foot was my height. It was in high school. Was my high school athletic director. And she had played college basketball on a five on three court if you know what that means. So I just remember that that's when only three people can cross the half court line. And I remember seeing her and being like, wow, I wish I had seen more people like that. I wish I had been able to read about them. I wish I would have been able to watch them on TV or view them in other places. The people that I looked up to were like an age older than me because that's all that was visible to me. There was definitely a height thing. It's like, well, I think I started playing when I was about 12 and I was probably five, 11. Time to do something with that height, I guess. But it was really just, it was something that, it was a genuine curiosity. Like it was something that I just thought was worth giving a try to. I will say that like my family is very rooted in kind of education and the arts. And so my mom was not super excited about me playing sports. So it was kind of my first act of rebellion to be honest because I fell in love with it. I was 13 going to Pat's Summit basketball camp at the University of Tennessee when I was spending the summers down there with my family. And I saw what was possible. It was the first time that it felt pretty normal to be as tall as I was. And it felt okay to be strong and to use my body to achieve my goals. And that was something that I learned kind of because I pursued something boldly that I didn't necessarily have the support for. Ultimately she very much came around and she was at all of my games and going to all of the tournaments. But yeah, with my mom, but it was something that I just, there was a fire lit inside and started with just curiosity and then realizing there's so many things available to me if I just stick with this. Yeah, I think my journey in sports was similar as well to both of yours. It was kind of, actually I was exposed to a lot of different sports as a little girl and tried them all and I was very lucky because I had lots of siblings to do them with. But I think that a big aspect for me with ski racing in particular was that it was such a fun social event and I think sports for kids, that's a lot of what draws us into them and then I think the reason I went more toward skiing versus the other sport is that it was definitely an opportunity for me to work really hard at something and kind of let my inner competitiveness shine. And in sport that's rewarded and I really loved the process of working hard at a goal and just giving that goal your all and then seeing what happened. I'd say looking back if I could tell my younger self a lesson I would maybe tell myself to be a little bit less stubborn and ask people for help because that was a lesson that took me a while to learn and I think is one of the most important ones I've learned from sport. Obviously these three women are sitting up here next to me and all of you have achieved such an incredible, just incredible accomplishments throughout your entire athletic and professional careers and obviously it wasn't easy. There were obstacles, maybe some failures. Can you talk about maybe a breaking point or maybe a failure or a tough point in your career and what you learned from it? For me, one of the moments that always sticks out for me is the college years for me because there was a lot of just pivotal moments where your back was up against the wall but for me I resisted change. I was scared of it. I was scared to change and grow. I was like, okay, I was successful in high school. I was successful doing what I'd always done. Always done, like why would I change something? Why wouldn't I just keep doing the same thing? And my development and my growth as a person especially but it also hurt me as an athlete because I wasn't willing to reevaluate things and that was a hard lesson for me to learn in college. We lost a lot of games because of that, because of my own personal unwillingness to change. If I had changed earlier I could have grown and evolved faster, right? I could have thought about things quicker and learned it faster, right? It's hard to change sometimes and it's scary especially when things that get you to a certain level like the collegiate level I played at Tennessee. Hey, Pat, some of you are the best. I bet I played softball there and I had to change to be able to reach the goals that I wanted. I had to change to be able to think about myself as an athlete in a different way and I had to change to bring other people with me, to bring a community with me and it took me a while to realize that but once I did, obviously the world opened up to me. Failure is such a tricky word because you learn so much when you fail and there's so much victory in what you learn that in some ways you can't get any other way. I'd say kind of one of the moments that stands out that didn't go the way I hoped it would go was when I was kind of done with my college career. I didn't get drafted into the WNBA but I ended up working out with a coach who was friends with the general manager of the New York Liberty and I grew up in New York City and I was a huge Liberty fan and it was just the serendipitous kind of connection where I'd been putting in the effort to improve as a player and she told her friend who happened to be the general manager of the New York Liberty so I'm like, oh my gosh, my destiny is just aligning, this is so perfect, I didn't get drafted but now I can go play for my home team in the WNBA and I got cut, I went and I played in training camp I played the best I ever played and I got cut and I was like, that can't be right. This is my dream, I'm supposed to, everything aligned perfectly and then what do you do in that moment when you have to kind of pick yourself back up and understand what the path forward is if this is where you actually want to be and so I went overseas and I played in Europe and worked on it and you take the feedback and if you can actually absorb it and not resist it and then actually use it to craft your path forward it really can be such an incredible benefit especially, and it's not often, sports is wonderful in that way and it gives you real feedback and it allows you to use that feedback and so I'd say that was an important moment for me because it showed me how much I wanted something and then it was up to me to decide what was I actually going to do to go and get it and it did work out, I did end up playing for the New York Liberty so it has a nice ending but it was not the pathway that I thought it would be, it was not a direct path. Yeah, this is such a great question because I think that it's easy to look at any one of us and to hear about what these amazing women have accomplished and you hear all the highlights and you don't often see the failures or hear about the time that I lost this race or I was cut but I think that just like Bethany said those are the opportunities that you can learn the most from and that has certainly been true in my career. I think all of my biggest inflection points have come from times when I've had my biggest defeats and it certainly doesn't feel good in the moment. I'm not someone who enjoys losing but I think that it's really important to know that it's okay, everyone does it, most people lose a lot especially if you're in an individual sport there's only gonna be one winner but to kind of let yourself feel that disappointment and then similar to what Bethany said, use it as feedback and just take a step back and think about okay what is my plan and try to learn from it as much as possible. One story from my career in particular is I went to when I was still very young I often cite this as the biggest inflection point in my career, I went to U16 Nationals and I came from a super small mountain. I didn't even know it was a race but I went to the other side of the country and I think I came last in almost every single event which was definitely hard to swallow but I used that feeling for the rest of the next season and just used that as motivation to really give ski racing my all and I just wanted to go back and not lose but I ended up going back the next year and doing very well and finishing I think fourth overall and that was when I made the national team so I think it's just another example of using setbacks not as failures but as opportunities to learn and grow and become a better athlete and person. So keep pushing. Yes for sure. Just keep pushing don't let anything get you down. Bethany I love that you mentioned that connection with New York and the Liberty were always on your mind kind of that goal and the importance of bulldozing that door down not allowing no to be an answer. How important is networking? So even past your playing career how much does sports how does it open the door for possibilities professionally for all of you women right now? Yeah I mean sports certainly now that I'm on the side and when I'm in a leadership role for the WNBA like sports is a relationship business and it makes sense that it is when you think about the fact that you have teammates like you're building relationships the time that you're growing as an athlete so yeah it is a relationship business and the role that I have now I got I actually started at the NBA working on the NBA side because the former teammate of mine from Stanford was like hey they're looking for somebody that has with a background that might be kind of similar to yours would you maybe want to take a look at this role? And I wasn't even thinking about it I was working I'd gone away from sports I was working at Deloitte doing strategy consulting like wasn't thinking about the game necessarily I always had I thought somewhere down the line I might want to work in sports but you know didn't have a defined timeline for that and a former teammate called me and it's like those are the connections you just never know kind of when something that you've done some connection that you made will come back to you in a way that is really positive and that's why it is so important to be building genuine authentic relationships no matter what it is that you're doing you just never know like if you can I have a funny like a coffee mug that I always have on my Zoom calls but it just says work hard and be kind to people and it really is this like very simple philosophy that can guide your relationship building because when people think of you that way and they know that you're going to put the effort in they know that no matter what it is you're doing whether it's on the court, field, boardroom you're going to put your entire all into it I think it really helps you know it helps people, it helps your brand when you think about how you are able to move through the various spaces within any industry but particularly within sports yeah I would say kind of like definitely teammates people you played with coaches and everything but just because I just wrote this and this question just sparked it but I wrote this book Rise and Shine and it's actually kind of funny the authors of this book were actually they were I wouldn't call they were fans they were Tennessee softball fans when I was there and they became big fans of mine their daughter was the same age as me and I was in a couple of classes at school with me and then they would come to the games when I was in college and then after you know 10, 20 years later however many years you want to say after the Tokyo Olympic Games you know they reached out to me and they're like hey like they called or text and was like hey we watched the games we loved seeing you play all of this stuff and they said you know if you ever want to write your book we love your story we followed you this whole time like please please consider us to be your authors at that time I had like you know maybe one day I'll write a book maybe I'll think about doing it and when they reached out to me I was like oh my gosh like this makes sense here I'm going across the country all the time speaking to you, speaking to colleges speaking to pros about how to make a difference with your career how to grow and change and evolve and all these things maybe it's time I put it on paper but the network that I had and the one off of my network right like a classmate whose parents became good friends they came to softball games socially I got to know them really well reached back out you know many years later and offered to write this book for me and that's literally why I did it literally why I have it today so pretty cool story and being able to create something yeah and I think my network maybe looks a little bit different as I'm still competing but I think that network and an extension of that at least for me is the community that I've been able to find through ski racing has been so important to me I as a little background was on the national team and then I was off the national team for a couple of years and during that time I really had to lean into my community and be humble enough to ask for help and reach out to all these people and I always say that was the biggest silver lining of having to race as an independent athlete because I'm not sure if I would have found that community in the same way if I didn't and that really opened me up to just how many people are out there and wanting to support you and love what you do and are inspired or motivated by it or just love your sport and I think that oftentimes it maybe is hard when you're super focused on your sport and you're competing overseas or you're doing individual sport to really see the broader community but I just think that that is so special and something every athlete should lean into because as you can see it definitely pays off down the road but more than anything it makes you feel like you're doing something bigger than just yourself and it also in my experience has created a really positive team behind me and has definitely led to so much of my success which I think it's just very special to be able to share what you do with as many people as possible and sport is definitely an amazing avenue for that and I've met my closest friends, my biggest supporters, so many role models through sport so I think that community is just the most important thing. And we are a community, women in sports. We are our own network and young girls watching can lean on women like us who are, well, I'm retired, you're not retired, you are, Monica just retired, can lean on us for advice and networking opportunities but how can young women and girls continue to break barriers in their sports? What you're saying is that you should lean on your community and take any opportunity you have to connect with women and girls that are maybe one level ahead of you or have done a similar experience because at least in my experience, I think that I resisted that for a little bit because I was just very independent or thought that my route was maybe different than others but there are so many people out there that even if their experience isn't the exact same as yours, they do have very, very valuable input and advice and I think just if you're a young girl and you do wanna break boundaries, you should ask for help and there are so many people out there that are willing and want to and excited to help you and I think that's how you're doing. I think that point's really a good one because the community that is standing ready to support young girls, I think there's a lot to be said about tapping into that community. I certainly, when I was first starting, especially since I was kind of being a little bit of a rebel, as I said, like I was very dependent on the teammates and the coaches and to see something past what was directly in front of me because I didn't have necessarily like an example of a professional women's basketball player to model myself after. So I do think that leaning into that and finding people and it's so much easier now because you have social media as a tool and it can be used effectively to connect people and so there are so many different communities. This one is an important one and I think the ability to find the people that you can see yourself in, both who are at the same stage of your journey but also to your point, a couple steps ahead can really be helpful when you're trying to do something bold or something you've never seen done before. Yeah, I think this one kind of holds close to my heart because I feel like we see a lot of barriers being broken these days but we still kind of have a ways to go, right? Especially us female athletes in our women's sports. The biggest thing I would say not only for, mostly probably to the parents watching or to the supporters watching is, one is like ask, like if you don't, there's something that your sport needs or your organization needs, ask, ask and if it's not there go create it, like go create it. People are there to support you and then for everyone else that's supporting or a fan or an athlete, think about how you can go and reinvest. So ask, ask your staff, ask your people like, hey, why don't we have a ice bath? Why don't we have a sauna? Why don't we have this? If it's not there, find a way to create it. Find a way to make it happen. And lastly for everyone else, like reinvest, reinvest your time, your resources, your money back into those sports and organizations that are driving it forward because that's, we women's sports, like when you think about the Title IX document, the 70s, right? But how long, I mean, how long has baseball been around, right? Like how long has men's sports been around? Like generations, like that's generational sports. Generations. And they keep coming back over and over, parents and grandparents and great-grandparents and their sons and their sons and their sons and their families, right? So for women's sports, it's really important that as the next generation gets born, the next generation plays and becomes CEOs and Olympians and broadcasters that we continue to ask, we continue to create the change and we continue to reinvest into our sports world. Speaking of that Title IX document, it's in this building. We got to see it before we came up here. What is seeing that mean to all of you individually? Yeah, I think it was very successful to see it and read it and it was a lot more formal than I anticipated, which I think that it's really good for us to see that document and see that was so formal because that was a huge deal because that was a huge change that needed to be made and we're now 51 years past that and there are still, as Monica said, changes that need to be made but I think that it's just a good reminder of that was change in a time that it seemed impossible that it was just such a big step and to see that and to know that we can continue taking those big steps towards equality in women's sports and so yeah, I think it's really motivational and I definitely encourage everyone to check out the museum exhibit. When I see that document, like the first word that pops into my head is opportunity. Just like, it gives me chills and almost makes me wanna tear up a little bit but when I see it, I see opportunity. It changed the entire landscape for women and I think there's a lot of people in this room or watching that can agree with me. There's a lot of people that have directly impacted my life that would say that same thing and I know for the fact it creates opportunities that probably half of us can't even imagine. Opportunity in one piece of paper. It changed everything. Often I think, especially, there's been so many conversations about the 50th anniversary of Title IX and we end up talking a lot about where is women's sports now because of 50 years of Title IX but I actually think it's so much broader than that when it's not even, when you think about the participation numbers and how many women have played sports. I've worked across different industries and now part of our leadership team at the WNBA or the commissioner of the WNBA played college basketball, right? So there's so many and she was the first female CEO of Deloitte, right? So it's not what she was never a professional basketball player. It's what sports afforded her that she then went and did the way she impacted and changed her community and that's true for so many different women and there's all the percentages around how many women in C-suite roles played sports at some point and that's what Title IX did too. Like it's not just where, and we do have a lot more ground to cover. I've loved in 50 years and the 100th anniversary of Title IX for us to be having a very different conversation about equity and about where women's sports is relative to their men counterparts but it's remarkable how sports can change lives even if all you do is pick it up for a little while and then go on and do something different and pursue your next passion. Yeah, the opportunities are endless for women in sports that's for sure. Still so much more growth to be had as well. I think it's that time to open it up for questions in the audience. So thank you very much. My name's Cornelia Weiss. I'm a former athlete as well and I come from the freestyle skiing world so it's great to see a skier up there. So part of opportunity also means financial opportunity because without money you can't compete, you can't do anything. And this is perhaps a question that's not answerable but I'll direct it to the media presence here because right now it's my understanding that there still are several contracts not signed for the women's soccer games that are coming up because you have these news, these television stations in Europe not willing to pay more than just absolutely peanuts and the numbers don't reflect that. So if you all could address money because money is a big opportunity and it's also a big barrier and it just, and you all couldn't have competed except for having the financial wherewithal to do that. Thank you. Yeah, money, right? That's a big topic. Where do I start on this? Okay, first off I would say one of the great things about the visibility is I think for a long time and this might be, I think I'm gonna tread lightly here. I think for a long time women's sports didn't have the numbers or the background data or information to support some of the bids and asks they were asking for at the major business levels, sponsorships, TV, all that stuff. But with women's sports getting more visibility, with women's sports creating stars, right? Like Instagram personalities, social media stars, numbers that are huge, right? On TV, you mentioned the college basketball finals, the women's college softball finals are incredible. With these numbers now we have background data. So now it's kind of like, okay, here are the facts. Now it's not just talk. Now here are the actual written down facts to be able to support it. So I think that's been a big step. Obviously money's always a challenge and... Yeah, I mean the media rights fees, that's always the conversation when it comes to women's sports. And I agree that there was a time when the viewership numbers, and we're thinking about the eyeballs on the game, like they weren't necessarily there. But we're starting to see, and it's not been that long that we're seeing these, viewership numbers start to change the way that they have. And I think there has to be a reevaluation of what do you get when you're consuming women's sports? And before, I think there's certainly a time when it was an altruistic endeavor or it's you do it because it's the right thing to do or you wanna be supportive of women. I think there's a piece of that that's still in there, but there's so much to be said about the actual quality of play that has changed. I think there has been a sea change when it comes to actually there's an audience now and there are viewership numbers that support that. When I think about the WNBA, what we do in terms of linear viewership, what we do in terms of social consumption, we're certainly on par with some professional men's leagues. So do our media rights fees reflect that yet? No, but I do think that it is coming and that's the next I think frontier for women's sports and when it comes to financials, specifically related to media rights. Yeah, I agree that it's also going back to, what we talked about with male sports being generational and Title IX just being 50 years ago, I think that the shift to equality will take some time and I think we are seeing positive trending in that direction. I know I feel super lucky to come from a sport that the two most successful ski racers are both women, Mikaela Shiffrin and Munzi Vaughn or two of the most in the US and Mikaela just is now the most winningest in the world, men and women. So I think that that is a huge testament to the progress we're making and I mean, her motto is always be faster than the boys. So like what's cooler than that? But it will take some time and I think that that's why it's so important to continue creating opportunities so that girls can dream to be the best in the world. And I think that money is obviously a huge issue and I think that that's why it's so important to support nonprofits and organizations like I play like a girl that are trying to create more opportunities and resources for young girls and boys that don't have access to it and I know that I feel super lucky to have sports in my life and that's something that's really important and yeah, I think that I can't speak enough about how powerful of an impact sport has been in my life which is why I would encourage everyone to try to support youth in grass root involvement in sport and amazing organizations like I play like a girl. First of all, let me thank the Dartmouth girl for her contribution to our alma mater. How would you all like to see the transgender issue resolved? I don't know, resolved is an interesting word. I think it's, you know, what we certainly from a lead from a WBA standpoint, we are very supportive of inclusiveness and you know, I think we don't, we've been supportive and I think our league by its very existence has been inactivist league for a really long time. You know, I think that the issue is certainly fraught and it's, you know, it brings a lot of very serious kind of implications to the sports landscape and you know, I don't think that you can, that everybody has some very personal beliefs on you know, what their direction should be but I think it's great that we're having conversation about it and I think that it's forcing people to really evaluate you know, their own personal stances on things that are really complex. So you know, certainly we have been supportive of transgender rights as a league and I think that we're seeing an evolution of the conversation that needs to be had. I don't think there's a right or wrong answer. I think it's very intricate and you know, I don't know that it, I don't know what resolution looks like because it is so complex. We have time for one more question. Well, let's go over here. Hi. I was wondering what your favorite part of playing sports is like, what do you like most about it? Ooh, that's a good question. If you want to start, I'll start. My favorite part about playing sports is definitely the friendships I've made and I think that the most special friendships all came from teammates during times when I was struggling the most. So when you're really sad, you're working really hard and it's not working out and you have teammates that are right there going through that with you and you're able to share that with them and work together. I think that just forms really special friendships and that's been the best part for me. The teammates, the connections of other women and girls who were when I was playing, that was the best part. When I think about what I miss the most, it's definitely the locker room. It's definitely just all the jokes and just all the, you know, there's so much that happens. It's such an awesome space because you are either, you know, preparing to go to war together or you're, you know, kind of supporting each other when you've been defeated and you're recovering where you're just, you know, and then just brings together all these different kinds of people from all different walks of life with a shared mission. It's really cool. Same, just I think that community, I think the sports community is very special. So I love that part about athletics, right? Like the community being on the field, being on the court, being competitive, going through the highs and lows on the field but then also off the field. You know, they're for a short amount of time, you know, they're the people that you see every single day and people that you go through a lot of things with, the highs and the lows and get a lot of laughs and good times with it along the way. Do you wanna ask another? Oh, are you sure? You look like you have a question. Okay. Thank you. One more question. Well, my question is, what are some mental and physical habits that young athletes should adopt to succeed? My first thing I think, when I think about habits, I think create a routine that is successful for you and then you can use it to adjust, you can constantly adjust to your routine. So as you prepare for practice, are you preparing the same way as you are preparing for a game? And then you can take little snippets of that routine, like your breathing exercises, your positive words, your mindset stuff, you can take those things into how you prepare for a test or a speech at school or a conversation with your parents, whatever it is. So you can take little things like that, but I really do believe in having a good routine and being very consistent in it so that it helps you maximize your potential on game day. I think, and not a whole lot more to add than that, I think the discipline around kind of how you prepare and the bigger level of preparation being of the utmost importance to you and then I really believe in visualization. So just like taking the time to really see yourself in a moment where you need to perform or even just visualizing yourself being at your peak health wise. So as in letting that guide the decisions that you make about food and diet and all that, that fuel your performance. So I agree, routine, discipline and visualization. I think mine would be to try to look at really challenging, hard situations in both sport and not sport as opportunities to grow because I think that in order to become a better athlete, you're going to have to challenge yourself and you're gonna have to play with the older girls or play against the better team. And if you can look at that as a really exciting opportunity to grow and to challenge yourself rather than be nervous for that, then I think that will push you. And I also think that you need to push yourself in order to see what your limits are. And I think that we're all a lot more capable than we think we are. So it's important to embrace challenges as really exciting opportunities to grow. That was a great question to close it off. Let's give another round of applause for our incredible panel, Monica Abbott, Bethany Jonathan and Trisha Mangan. And thank you to the National Archives and Play Like a Girl for teaming up to host this incredible event. And thank you all for coming out and enjoying this incredible event. So you can meet us all in the lobby for a little bit of networking and a photo opportunity. Thank you for joining us.