CSU athletic trainers say they left because of athletic department’s ‘negligent,’ ‘toxic’ culture
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CSU athletes, staff say athletic administration covering up COVID-19 health threat
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The final day of athletic trainer Mike DeLuca’s six-year Colorado State career came last Friday, the same day the university announced it paid $107,397.50 to an outside firm for its two-month investigation into the CSU athletic department’s handling of COVID-19 and racial insensitivity issues.
He said that was appropriate given the reasons why he left the university included the “university’s so-called investigation” by law firm Husch Blackwell and subsequent report that President Joyce McConnell used to create an action plan to address the issues.
DeLuca is the second athletic trainer to leave the athletic department recently. In an email to McConnell last week, he said he has witnessed CSU fail to adhere to COVID-19 protocols and that he was lied to by one of Husch Blackwell’s investigators about contacting student-athletes for the investigation.
The other trainer said she left for the same reasons as DeLuca but wished not to be identified as she seeks another job. She reported to investigators that two football players over the summer told her a coach instructed them to not report COVID-19 symptoms and to lie on daily questions concerning COVID-19 symptoms so that they wouldn’t miss practice.
A Coloradoan story in which student-athletes and athletic staff alleged a COVID-19 cover-up led to McConnell’s call for an investigation in early August.
The report included statements from student-athletes and athletic staff that corroborated and denied the accounts by the trainers.
“If you’re going to make recommendations, you have to do a thorough investigation,” DeLuca, who found a similar job at another university, said in a Tuesday interview. “Me and others told the investigators what we had experienced and for President McConnell to come out and say that most people feel OK further creates negligence and a toxic atmosphere in which me and a lot of people don’t feel OK about.”
McConnell said previously in a statement to the CSU community that “there were no significant issues identified around COVID-19 protocol compliance in CSU Athletics” in the report’s findings, and overall the report results were “positive and reassuring overall” while acknowledging some issues.
McConnell’s action plan calls for, among other things, a system for student-athletes to report concerns to an employee outside of the athletic department and continued or supplemental diversity and inclusion training university-wide, with a special focus on the athletic department.
The Board of Governors also issued a public statement supporting the administration based on the findings.
CSU responded to an email interview request with McConnell that stated, “As a general rule CSU doesn’t discuss personnel matters or hearsay allegations, so we would not have anything to add re: the email you referenced.”
A request last week to the Board of Governors for an interview regarding its statement was not returned.
What the investigation said: See the full reports here
Those statements have been the central focus of growing frustration from faculty, athletic staff, CSU organizations, student-athletes and students who have publicly grilled administration regarding the issues and have called into question the legitimacy of the investigation.
Alleged lies, sexual relationship
In an email exchange last week and this week that DeLuca had with McConnell and shared with the Coloradoan, he explained he was leaving because of what he said was an athletic department that was “negligent” and “toxic” and one he couldn’t trust to put the health and well-being of student-athletes first.
DuLuca, who was a volleyball and swim trainer, included incidents he witnessed involving CSU knowingly violating Centers for Disease Control and Prevention regulations pertaining to improper quarantine of volleyball players.
He also pointed to an alleged sexual relationship between an athletic staff member and a football player that he and others reported to Diana Prieto, vice president for Equity, Equal Opportunity and Title IX, this summer. Such a relationship is condemned by university policy and can lead to disciplinary action.
DeLuca said the CSU employee told him she had sex with the player but that Prieto found no grounds for discipline. Accounts of the sexual relationship were corroborated by other athletic staff and student-athletes by the Coloradoan during previous reporting.
DeLuca said he told investigators that he was interviewed by CSU human resources about the incident but nothing happened.
McConnell responded to DeLuca’s email by forwarding it to Prieto, copying DeLuca and acknowledging she reported it to Prieto for her investigation.
In the email exchange, Prieto responded to DeLuca saying, “After our meeting during the investigation I conducted this summer, I am not surprised to hear you have left for another position and am sorry to hear this was the step you felt you needed to take.”
DeLuca also asserts in the email that Husch Blackwell investigator Hayley Hanson lied to him about contacting four volleyball players as part of the investigation into what he said was improper COVID-19 protocol regarding the exposure athletes had to a teammate who tested positive and subsequent non-quarantine of the athletes.
“She went out of her way to call me and thank me for all that information,” DeLuca said. “And when I asked her if she talked to those athletes she lied and said ‘yes, but not all of them.’ After leaving CSU, I asked the four athletes if she reached out to them and they all said they weren’t contacted.
“It is demoralizing to be completely lied to and then we are supposed to believe in the findings.”
The four volleyball players in question individually supported DeLuca’s claim that they were not contacted by Hanson via text message responses to the Coloradoan.
Hanson did not respond to emails last week and this week requesting an interview.
DeLuca said the decision by Terry DeZeeuw, head athletic trainer, and Jeannine Riess, CSU public health administrator, to allow the players to participate in practice violated CDC regulations at the time and knowingly placed the players and himself at increased risk of contracting the virus.
“When I explained to Terry about the incident where the players were exposed and needed to be quarantined, his reply was, ‘I don’t pay you to argue with me, plus the health department says she can play so you have to clear her,’ ” DeLuca said. “And one of the players got COVID from the incident I wanted her quarantined from.”
Husch Blackwell is the same Kansas City-based firm that is conducting the highly publicized LSU sexual misconduct investigation. CSU also hired the firm in 2018 to review its Title IX office, which cost $8,000, according to CSU.
The Coloradoan requested the review but a CSU spokesperson said the university would not share it due to attorney-client privileges.
McConnell restructured the office after she became the university’s first female president in July 2019, naming Prieto to head the new office.
In recent months, similar investigations have taken place and student-athletes have conducted protests across college campuses. The most recent event involved Utah State, where football players opted not to play its game against CSU last Saturday after alleged comments made by school president Noelle Cockett regarding interim coach Frank Maile’s religious background and ethnicity.
Searching for solutions
Faculty, athletic staff, CSU organizations, student-athletes and students have implored McConnell to not rely on Husch Blackwell’s findings as the basis for decisions but instead engage in candid conversations with those who have expressed their concerns involving experiences related to COVID-19, racial insensitivity, verbal abuse and sexual misconduct.
McConnell said initially that all issues would be investigated by Husch Blackwell but that was later scaled back to only focusing on COVID-19 adherence, racial insensitivity and verbal abuse/harassment. The report acknowledged that sexual assault and other Title IX issues were brought to investigators’ attention during interviews.
What started all of this?: Hidden in plain sight
Jordan Acosta, a CSU softball player and one of CSU’s representatives on the Mountain West Student-Athlete Advisory Committee, said she has sent McConnell email addresses and phone numbers of more than 20 faculty and student-athletes who have agreed to discuss their issues with the president.
Acosta said she has also sent all her email exchanges with McConnell to the Board of Governors and the CSU Faculty Council in hopes that it would spur critical discussions. The council did meet virtually Dec. 1 with McConnell, Prieto and Jannine Mohr, CSU’s deputy general counsel, to discuss their concerns.
McConnell met virtually with a group of student-athletes, including Acosta, on Nov. 20 during which they asked McConnell to fire athletic director Joe Parker, deputy athletic director Steve Cottingham and Shalini Shanker, senior associate director of compliance.
Acosta said, of that list, McConnell only met with Barry Braun, professor and head of CSU’s Department of Health and Exercise Science, and has attempted to meet with two STAAC members.
“At first I was optimistic because she set immediately up a meeting with Dr. Braun,” Acosta said. “But since then she has mostly been redirecting everything so that she can avoid knowing the truth by not listening to people who have experienced these things.”
Joshua Gordon, a lawyer who teaches at the University of Oregon and who has conducted investigations of college athletic departments, has read the Husch Blackwell report and McConnell’s email statements regarding the findings.
He said the report looked “reasonable” and said McConnell’s system for student-athletes to report concerns to an employee outside of the athletic department was a positive step.
However, he categorized the investigation more as an assessment because it took a broad look at the issues and didn’t appear to address individuals.
He said as someone who also consults universities going through investigations that CSU’s apparent lack of transparency, the findings emphasizing percentages, such as “majority,” and McConnell’s messaging highlighting the word “majority” is likely to continue to cause frustration because some people feel that minimizes those who have experienced the issues.
“If you don’t provide people a forum, they will find their own. So if they really want to move forward in a productive way, the university will need to give the key stakeholders voicing concern a seat at the table,” Gordon said.
CSU inclusion: Mary Onitveros lived it
Abolish CSUPD was the latest group to send a letter to the CSU community condemning the administration’s handling of the issues and validity of the findings.
Erica Lafehr, a CSU graduate student in ethnic studies and part of the group, said CSU’s own data on the status of women faculty points out that female student-athletes face the same systemic issues that faculty women face and further dispels the administration’s attempt at discrediting those who are advocating for systemic change.
“Accountability isn’t always about punishment,” Lafehr said. “But the more the administration digs its heels into the sand, the more pain it causes the university.
“It’s time we face the hard truth together and do the hard work of acknowledging experiences, having conversations and working towards changing the culture for a better campus.”
Reporter Miles Blumhardt looks for stories that impact your life. Be it news, outdoors, sports — you name it, he wants to report it. Have a story idea? Contact him at milesblumhardt@coloradoan.com or on Twitter @MilesBlumhardt. Support his work and that of other Coloradoan journalists by purchasing a digital subscription today.
This article originally appeared on Fort Collins Coloradoan: CSU athletic trainers say they left because of athletic department’s ‘negligent,’ ‘toxic’ culture