BURLINGTON — The Burlington High School girls’ soccer team’s calls for gender pay equality went viral this fall and are receiving additional acclaim after being mentioned in stories in Time and Sports Illustrated.
The team has sold more than 4,000 #equalpay jerseys since launching the effort in October. The team has brought in $120,000 in jersey sales and will have more than $60,000 to donate, said Aly Johnson-Kurts of Change the Story Vermont, a nonprofit working with the team.
The efforts received national attention this fall after team members received yellow cards for removing their jerseys during a game to reveal #equalpay T-shirts underneath.
The team plans to donate a portion of the funds raised to the Greater Burlington Girls Soccer League. Team members hope the funding will help the league with outreach to have a wider variety of participants.
The team is also working with the Vermont Community Foundation and Vermont Women’s Fund to establish an Equal Pay Fund with other monies raised.
“This will enable them to make decisions at a later date about additional funds beyond what the Greater Burlington Girls Soccer League can absorb, where they want to put that in terms of supporting women’s empowerment programs and efforts across the state,” Johnson-Kurts said.
Team members will retain decision-making power over how the funds are used, Johnson-Kurts said.
“There’s just a lot more money than they expected to come in, so they are branching out into supporting other efforts to support women and girls across the state,” Johnson-Kurts said.
Klara Martone, Burlington’s senior goalie, told VTDigger in October that the players wanted to bring increased attention to the pay gap between men and women.
“The idea that we could work this hard and still make less money just based on our gender is incredible to me,” Martone said. “We want to live in our adult lives in a world where we don’t have to worry about making less money.”
Sports Illustrated named U.S. women’s national team star Megan Rapinoe the 2019 “Sportsperson of the Year” Monday.
“Playing the world’s game, on the world’s stage, under attack by a world leader, she dominated,” the magazine described. “And in doing so without fear, Megan Rapinoe became a voice for so many across the world.”
Sports Illustrated’s Jenny Vrentas wrote that the Burlington High School’s efforts were an example of attention Rapinoe has received since the World Cup.
“A high school girls’ soccer team in Burlington, Vt., staged its own campaign in support of equal pay, and an 11-year-old boy in Geneva, Ill., went viral for his pink-haired Halloween costume, each inspired by Rapinoe,” Vrentas wrote.
Time named the U.S. women’s national soccer team as its “Athlete of the Year” and used the Burlington High School team’s work as an example of the spread of the national team’s equal pay efforts.
“It’s scary that these women can be the best in the world and they’re still fighting for pay equality,” BHS senior Maia Vota told Time. “I don’t want to see that in my future.”
Time also spoke with Roger Ranz, the referee who issued the yellow cards to the girls. He said that while protocol required the penalty, he believes in the cause promoted by the BHS team and national team.
Johnson-Kurts said the team has received additional demand for jerseys in the last week following the publication of the Time and Sports Illustrated stories.
“I think people are seeing the story nationally, we’ve had international sales coming in, and we’re shipping all over,” Johnson-Kurts said. “We’re excited by all the attention these stories have given Vermont-based efforts for equal pay.”
Sen. Patrick Leahy commended the team’s efforts in a Dec. 5 address in Congress, and entered VTDigger’s Oct. 22 story on the team’s efforts into the Congressional Record.
Leahy said he supported the team and stands in solidarity with women demanding equal pay for equal work.
“The lesson here is simple, and the voices could not be clearer: Equal pay for equal work should not be controversial, nor should it be challenged,” he said.