Keeping Up With the Alumni: Featuring Kayla Treanor
On September 10th, US Lacrosse announced a new virtual series called "She Competes" that launched late in September. According to US Lacrosse, the six-part series had the aim of exploring "...some of the issues that impact young girls and women in sports, both as athletes and members of the sports industry." Kayla Treanor was one of the Syracuse alumni selected to participate in the event. She served as one of the panelists for the last webinar of the series that was on Diversity and Inclusion.
Treanor was joined by Jazmine Smith from Eyekonz Sports, Tari Kandemiri most known for her growing social media presence as a lacrosse expert, and Noelle Lambert, a U.S. paralympic track and field athlete and former lacrosse player at UMass Lowell. The moderator was Amari Pollard, former Lemoyne Women's Lacrosse athlete and current author for Inside Lacrosse.
At Syracuse, Treanor was undoubtedly one of the most successful Syracuse Women's Lacrosse athletes to graduate from the school, being named as a Tewaaraton Award finalist at Syracuse her sophomore, junior, and senior year. Treanor also joined the U.S. National Team during the 2015-2016 season, which was part of the reason that she was selected to be a part of the web series.
Now, four years after graduating from Syracuse, she is the assistant coach at Boston College. In 2019, Treanor led BC to the most productive offense in output in program history with 404 goals on the season. One of the reasons that having Treanor on the panel was so interesting is because many of the questions that Treanor was asked to answer were in regards to how she is handling topics regarding diversity and inclusion with her current players.
Diversity and Inclusion is arguably one of the most difficult topics to talk about, but it remains one of the most important. As promised, Treanor discussed the ways that she identifies with these concepts and participants in the webinar, myself included, were able to find out what role diversity and inclusion has played in her life. Luckily, I was able to speak to Treanor on the phone afterwards and dive deeper into some of the issues discussed in the webinar and find out how diversity and inclusion has impacted her personally.
Part of the reason that Treanor was so comfortable discussing diversity and inclusion in the webinar is because some of her family members have dedicated their life's work to social justice. Treanor's mother worked at a domestic violence shelter and was always a very big advocate for peaceful protests. Treanor said that all throughout her childhood, she was watching her mother protesting for different unions or associations. Treanor's dad was a special education teacher.
Coming from that background, Treanor was surrounded by people who were having frequent conversations about concepts like diversity and inclusion, so she was exposed to those values at a young age. Consequently, she developed an understanding of why diversity and inclusion are important very early on in her life.
"I grew up in an environment where my family participated in things like this [protests] and wanted to work in diverse environments," Treanor said. "They [her parents] wanted their children to interact with people that didn't just look like them."
Treanor admits that she knows growing up in a family that had these kinds of conversations makes her one of the lucky ones.
"We [her family] are not a black family but we certainly talk about issues of racism and social injustice in our country, but I think for kids where their families don't talk about it, this is really challenging for them."
What's even harder, arguably, is when families are having these conversations, but there is an issue they don't agree upon. This was one of the topics brought up in the webinar. How do you go about navigating a conversation with a family member about a serious topic or value pertaining to diversity and inclusion that you don't agree on? Treanor explains why this is such a difficult situation.
"It's particularly hard when it's conversations within your family because those are the people that you love, those are the people that you trust," Treanor said. "So to start having this dialogue...and hear someone you love saying something really inappropriate or racist or sexist, that's hard."
Which part is hard, exactly? For Treanor, it is the aspect of having to openly disagree with someone who you have built such a strong relationship with.
"It's easy to...challenge somebody who you have challenged before, but when it's in your own home it's certainly more challenging."
Nevertheless, she encourages and urges her players at Boston College to still have these conversations, regardless of if they are uncomfortable.
"If they [her players] want to be more inclusive, I think it is important that they have these conversations [with their families]," Treanor said. "You might not get to a point where you change their opinions...but they might take one thing from it and then you're in a better place."
Even though conversations about diversity and inclusion often can and will be uncomfortable, Treanor made clear that what's worse is not having these conversations at all. Even if that means saying the wrong thing sometimes.
"For me, in my position as a white girl whose had a lot of privilege, it's important that I get called out and it's important that I understand other people's experiences," Treanor said. "Because I haven't had those experiences and it's important to understand where other people are coming from."
One place where Treanor thinks she can be a difference maker in having these conversations is within athletics, especially on the women's side.
"We need to create safe spaces for our players," Treanor said. "You might not be perfect but you've got to be willing to have them [conversations about diversity and inclusion] because by having them, you're showing your players what it's like to be uncomfortable and care about people."
One of the biggest challenges that Treanor and other female lacrosse icons have in promoting more discussion about diversity and inclusion is that they lack a platform. In 2018, the Women's Professional Lacrosse League was born. However, two short seasons later, the league collapsed due to a lack of funding. This has made it hard for female lacrosse athletes at the professional level like Treanor to make as big of an impact as they would want to.
"We have our social media platforms but we don't have a league to support us," Treanor said. "I think that's our biggest challenge for female lacrosse players right now is we're not even playing. There's no avenues for us right now."
Despite the roadblocks that the lacrosse industry has faced this year, Treanor was able to reflect on the successes that female athletes in other sports have had this year in their strides to fight for racial justice.
'You know all of these leagues, WNBA, NWSL...have been incredible in creating social justice reform and working to use their platform...black voices are being heard," Treanor said. "There's a lot of room that we need to go, but I think it's very powerful what's happening right now."