Raising the Bar for Supporting Mothers Participating in Race Events
&Mother partners with Salomon to pilot new standards for lactation support and child care at the Salomon WMN Trail Half Marathon.
BERKELEY, CA & OGDEN, UT (September 22, 2022)
&Mother is excited to announce a new partnership with Salomon, a global leader in trail running, to kick off a project aimed at standardizing support services for parents participating in recreational athletic events. These support services will be introduced at the Salomon WMN Trail Half Marathon on Saturday, September 24 in the Marin Headlands of the San Francisco Bay Area.
The inaugural Salomon WMN Trail Half Marathon will be the first trail race to pilot support structures that alleviate barriers to participation by new mothers and those caring for small children. With guidance from &Mother, the event will provide free child care for race participants in addition to start-finish line lactation space with full pumping and nursing accommodations. The event has also implemented a deferral process to allow those unable to participate due to pregnancy or postpartum recovery to participate in a future race.
“As a brand, we’re always thinking of ways to bring more people into the sport and that starts with looking at the barriers that might prevent participation,” said Erin Cooper, Senior Marketing Manager, Run & Outdoor Salomon North America. “With the guidance of &Mother, we’re thrilled to be able to pull off our first of many events that provide top to bottom support for mothers and those caring for children.”
Founded by Olympian Alysia Montaño, &Mother aims to break the barriers that limit a woman’s choice to pursue and thrive in both career and motherhood. Inspired by Alysia’s own experience as told in the viral New York Times Op-Ed, &Mother’s programs aim to flatten barriers related to participation and success for mothers in professional sports as a way to demonstrate a supportive and enabling path for all mothers in all industries.
“I am thrilled that my story has influenced our work with &Mother and inspired companies within the sports industry to adapt standards that support and allow women to participate and succeed,” said &Mother Founder, Alysia Montaño. “Sports has the ability to change the world and inspire other industries to create opportunities for mothers to thrive in their career and motherhood.”
Setting a new standard for parental support at races also serves to demonstrate the necessary structures for the future of work and recreation when it comes to gender equity and parenting. Access to quality child care allows for the necessary time and space that mothers need not only for career advancement but also for personal development, recreation, rest, and more. Access to lactation space that fully accommodates the needs of those choosing to pump or breastfeed provides flexibility such that choices around breastfeeding and pumping are not limited by the lack of structure outside of the home.
For the latter, the WMN Trail Half Marathon will pilot having breast pumps available at the start and finish lines as well as at aid stations on the race route, giving participants an easy option for pumping and storing their milk. The breast pumps and sets of individually-wrapped, sanitized accessories will be provided by Babyation, a technology company that creates products that meet the holistic needs of parents. The Babyation Pump is FDA-cleared for multi-use and improves the entire pumping experience with the world’s smallest breast shields, ultra-quiet motor, vacuum-boost technology™, and built-in milk storage.
"For too long women in sports have lacked adequate support to train and compete when they decide to become mothers. At Babyation we value women. We value their time, their bodies, and their physical and emotional labor. We are delighted to be partnering with &Mother and Salomon to better support women participating in recreational events and over time, help to dismantle the barriers that continue to hold countless female athletes back from achieving their goals,” said Sam Rudolph, co-founder and CEO of Babyation.
Our goal over the next several years is to expand testing to additional race environments and iterate on solutions while demonstrating the impact and importance of event-related services that allow for greater parental inclusion.
National issues; like, access to affordable child care and breastfeeding/pumping accommodations are slow to move and it is clear to us at &Mother that we need a cultural shift and we can be at the forefront of future progress. By partnering with Salomon at events like the WMN Trail Half Marathon, this goes beyond helping a few individuals; it demonstrates how to dismantle barriers that enable parents to participate without compromise.
&Mother invites anyone who has experienced or may experience current limitations for parental participation in races to complete this survey.
Introducing Our 2022 Changemaker & Mother Grantees
The Changemaker & Mother grant program focuses on a central tenet of our organization – enabling and supporting women to become the driving force changing their working world. By definition, 'changemakers' take creative action to solve a social problem for the greater good. In our eyes, we see our changemakers advocating for gender equity and working motherhood in their professional sport.
Powered by Culturelle Probiotics, we're able to award 14 inspiring athletes and mothers with funds to support their individual efforts to dismantle the barriers that limit how athletes excel in their careers when, and even before, they decide to start a family. These efforts take time. And we recognize and value their time. That’s why these grants can be attributed to time dedicated to change-making initiatives and/or support related to being a working caregiver (i.e. childcare, family travel, etc.).
The best part: their change-making efforts are as unique as they are. From sailing to skiing, and wrestling to para volleyball, they represent motherhood across the sports industry. Keep your eyes and ears open as these mamas and mamas-to-be use their platforms to shake up the motherhood narrative, catalyzing &Mother’s mission forward. Over the coming months, we’ll be telling their stories and amplifying their work. Until then, join us in congratulating each of these amazing humans and read more about each of their journeys here
Elana Meyers Taylor - Bobsled
Sarah Newberry Moore Sailing
Jackie Paaso - Big Mountain Skiing
Sarah Tru - Triathlon
Aliphine Tulimuk - Running
Meredith Kessler - Triathlon
Erin Huck - XC MT Bike
Sarah Piampiano - Triathlon
Adeline Gray - Wrestling
Lauren Fendrick - Beach Volleyball
Kaleo Maclay - Para Volleyball
Gwen Jorgensen - Triathlon
Makenna Myler - Running
Kaillie Humphries - Bobsled
Announcing the Launch of our Child Care Initiative, in Partnership with Athleta and Allyson Felix!
Child care is an essential support structure at the intersection of career and motherhood.
Without access to affordable, reliable, and safe childcare, women bear the brunt of caregiving responsibilities and, all-to-often, downshift their career or leave the workforce altogether as a result. And the child care crisis is growing.
At &Mother, we aim to elevate the child care conversation through solutions that not only support athlete parents but also create cultural and structural change within the sports industry and beyond.
In partnership with Athleta and Allyson Felix, we are proud to announce a pilot to provide free child care at a key Track and Field championship this week and demonstrate a new standard when it comes to truly supporting the participation and excellence of mothers and caregivers.
The pilot is the first step on the road to standardizing supportive services for parents participating in career-defining athletic events. With this project, we aim to: illuminate the childcare-related barriers for athlete parents; test and iterate on solutions; demonstrate the impact and importance of event-related services that allow for greater parental inclusion; and set new standards to ensure the child care barrier no longer limits an athlete’s participation and excellence.
Sports is a microcosm for what mothers experience across industries when the workplace structure does not reflect the needs of the modern worker. Through this lens, we have an opportunity to examine child care solutions for a “non-traditional” workplace. Athletes and coaches can’t “work from home”, competition and travel schedules do not align with most child care options, but we CAN solve for these challenges. By focusing on a career-defining, elite Track & Field event for our first pilot, we aim to demonstrate that even in this “non-traditional” workplace, we can find a child care solution that both adapts beyond the structure of 9-5 corporate settings and have impacts on how women and caregivers participate and excel when supported.
Adding to the brilliant mix of the Athleta + Allyson Felix partnership, we brought in the incredible team at Vivvi to be our childcare partner for the project. Vivvi is an employer-based child care provider with a range of programs that meet parents “where they are”. This week, their team will be providing stellar programming for a range of ages so that parents can rest assured that their kids are well cared for and happy.
Another important piece of the puzzle – making a critical statement: parenting exists here. Women drop from the workforce when they either feel that career and motherhood are mutually exclusive or they’ve been shown that career and motherhood are mutually exclusive. Having supportive services available, like child care, goes beyond the actual need at individual events – it sends a message and impacts the narrative that women are (and can be) both elite athletes AND mothers.
Read more here.
Or listen here.
Happy Mother's Day!
Wow, another Mother’s Day already?!
And since this day is kind of our &Mother birthday 🥳, it feels timely to do a recap and a look ahead…
It has certainly been a whirlwind few years for us. Starting with our Founder, Alysia Montano’s NYTimes op-ed on Mother’s Day 2019, followed by our Board member, Allyson Felix’s own call out. When we saw how these stories resonated deeply with women across America (and the world!) -- highlighting the motherhood penalty and maternal bias in a way that reflected their own experiences in the working world -- we knew we had to transition the movement into impact.
We launched &Mother on Mother’s Day 2020, joining a brave legion of gender equity warriors, adding our unique focus on the intersection of systemic barriers, professional opportunity, and motherhood.
As we round the corner into year three, we are stepping up our work to identify, call out, and take down the visible and invisible barriers that limit a woman’s choice to pursue and thrive in BOTH career AND motherhood. With a focus on paving the way for full participation and success for mothers in sports, we will continue to use this as a way to demonstrate a supportive and enabling path for all mothers in all industries.
The workplace, in every form it takes – the track, the courtroom, the airplane, the office, the hospital… – was not built for motherhood. We have a once-in-a-generation opportunity, right now, to stand up for what we need and what we should expect to allow for our talent, our expertise, and our VALUE ADD as mothers, to flourish. But we need to move faster.
At &Mother, we aspire to live in a society where the value of mothers in the workforce is intrinsic and motherhood is not a limiting factor in how women succeed professionally and personally. And we’ll keep working towards this vision until the world truly reflects our Mother’s Day mantra:
Celebrate mothers. VALUE motherhood.
Happy Mother’s Day!
Announcing New “Changemaker & Mother” Award Program for Athletes and Coaches Working to Advocate towards Gender Equity and Working Motherhood in Professional Sports.
BERKELEY, CA - March 8th, 2022 – We are excited to announce a new grant program addressing gender inequity in the sports industry related to motherhood.
The Changemaker & Mother Award program focuses on a central tenet for &Mother – enabling and supporting women to become the driving force changing their working world. With our current focus on gender equity and maternal inclusion in the sports industry, the first year of grantees will include athletes and coaches working to advocate in their individual sports, roles, institutions, or for working motherhood more broadly.
“There is a range of invisible barriers related to motherhood that limit how athletes and coaches excel in their careers when, and even before, they decide to start a family. Dismantling these barriers will be key to advancing gender equity in sports,” says Molly Dickens, co-founder and Executive Director, “Everyone has an opportunity to call out the barriers and advocate for a better, more inclusive path forward. This award is our way to welcome in and support the incredible women ready to make change now and for future generations.”
Each award will be up to $5,000 and will support individual efforts to explore, examine, and/or implement systemic and structural solutions that enhance women’s participation and ability to excel in their career. In addition, Changemakers will be invited to work with the &Mother team to build awareness and connect with the broader community around the universal elements of working motherhood.
Funds can be attributed to time dedicated to change-making initiatives and/or support related to being a working caregiver (i.e. childcare, family travel, etc.).
The Changemaker & Mother Award program was made possible through a generous gift from &Mother’s National Partner, Culturelle Probiotics.
Interested applicants can learn more and apply below!
&Mother Announces Culturelle Probiotics as a 2022 National Partner, Helping to Support &Mother’s New Changemaker Award Program
BERKELEY, CA - FEBRUARY 13TH, 2022 – We are excited to announce that Culturelle® Probiotics is continuing as an &Mother National Partner for their second year!
Through the support from Culturelle® Probiotics, will will be launching a new grant program – the Changemaker Award. Up to ten awardees will be invited to contribute to ongoing &Mother initiatives to identify, test, and standardize solutions that enhance how women excel and thrive personally and professionally in sports.
A key goal at &Mother is to enable any individual to become the driving force behind the organization’s mission and change the way the working world sees, supports, and values motherhood. The Changemaker Award program will allow us to elevate and amplify individuals within the sports industry who are working to address systemic issues and create structural change for new mothers. The Award program will be officially announced and open for applicants by early March.
Through the continued partnership with &Mother, Culturelle® Probiotics aims to bring visibility to the challenges all women face in the workforce and empower those making waves in the fight for gender equity. The Culturelle® Probiotics brand has always taken a leadership position in helping women take charge of their health and wellness.
“Culturelle® Probiotics is excited to reignite our partnership with &Mother this year to continue to bring a timely and worthy cause to attention. By supporting &Mother and their mission, we can directly contribute to helping incredible women thrive in their careers and at home, while making waves through change-making initiatives,” said Maha Elkharbotly, President & CEO of i-Health, and &Mother Advisory Board member. “i-Health’s mission is to improve the lives of our consumers and working with &Mother is an extremely impactful way to further this mission.”
“It is incredible to have the ongoing support of Culturelle® Probiotics as a National Partner heading into our third year as an organization.” said Molly Dickens, co-founder and Executive Director of &Mother. “We deeply appreciate the mission-alignment between &Mother and Culturelle® Probiotics, and, with their partnership, we will continue to open up exciting avenues to accelerate our impact through 2022 and beyond.”
If you are an athlete or coach looking to get involved in changing how sports industry values and supports motherhood, please keeps eyes on this space or get in touch – hello@andmother.org – to learn more about the Changemaker Award.
Meet Elana Meyers Taylor...
Bobsledder Elana Meyers Taylor is ready to suit up for her FOURTH Olympic Games, this time with her son, Nico, by her side. We asked Elana to describe all the ins and outs, joys and challenges of navigating life as an athlete AND mother and captured her response in the video below:
More from Elana:
"The biggest challenge I've had in balancing sport and motherhood is just how to logistically make it all work. As bobsledders, we travel for six months out of the year. We don't often get to come back to our home or even to the States. So how to care for and raise a child while you're on the road, while you're in Europe, while you're in Asia, all these different places. It can be quite a challenge. Also, my husband is a bobsledder as well, so we're both doing this balancing act. It's chaos every single day. But we do what we can and we make the most of it."
Having Nico and being able to share this journey with him has changed everything in my life. He's given me a new motivation. After the 2018 Olympics, I wasn't sure that I wanted to keep bobsledding and what my motivation was. I think as Olympic athletes, you always have the motivation of a medal. But after winning three medals, I needed something else. I needed something besides a medal to keep pushing for it, to go through all the pain and the hard work and the challenges. And Nico brought that to my life.
"It became a challenge of trying to prove what's possible and show my son that, despite all obstacles you face, you can overcome and you can persevere and you can go after your goals. I want to show him that you can go live your dreams. I want to show him that people are always going to tell you what's not possible and you're going to have to make the decision to to try to do what's not possible anyways. He's going to face that his entire life. And me facing that in bobsled is a small sample of what it's going to be like for him. Despite people telling me that it's not possible as a mom to continue to be in the sport of bobsled, I'm going to go after it anyways."
I think as women, we know that we don't want to be limited by what we can do, and that includes motherhood. I want to be able to be an elite athlete and a mother. It's always been my dream to do this. So the fact that I'm out here doing it, that I'm striving after my goals, it's amazing. It's an amazing feeling to be able to go after your goals and do this with your kid."
I think one of my greatest joys is coming home from races and seeing Nico and seeing how happy is to see me. And when he crawls into my arms, he's just so excited. He doesn't know what happened at the race. He doesn't really care either. But he loves me unconditionally, and that's something that's very powerful."
-- Elana Meyers Taylor, 4x Olympic bobsledder #andmother to two-year-old Nico
Showing the world how incredible women, like Elana, can thrive in both career and motherhood is central to everything we do. But they cannot do it without support. And neither can we. We are proud to play a small part is supporting Elana's journey and telling her story and your ongoing support for &Mother allows us to continue our work resetting the narrative around career and motherhood and paving the way for broader change in sports and beyond.
Oh, Hello, 2022!
When we launched &Mother in the early days of the pandemic, we had no idea that a global event would push millions of women out of the workforce or that nearly two years of pandemic parenting would bring into public consciousness all the invisible barriers that caregivers (predominantly mothers!) face when it comes to navigating family and career. But here we are, in the middle of the fray, barreling towards year two, during yet another winter of work + parenting + COVID.
Through your experiences and our own, we see those barriers and the systemic and structural failures that brought working motherhood to the breaking point. We also see the opportunities to mend and re-build, to help rearrange the blended nature of aspiration and work and parenting and health. We know that patchwork is not sufficient – we need to fully reimagine the working world to center respect for human value, female leadership, and maternal experience. Women deserve this. And EVERYONE benefits.
We are here for this challenge.
As you may know, our first initiative focuses on aligning the systems and structures within the sports industry to support the choices that athletes make around career and motherhood. We are starting here because we know that this career path – and the maternal wall that women face – stands in as a microcosm for what women experience across professions. The pandemic effects on working mothers have only further highlighted this comparison.
As one advisor reminded us: “Providing a structural framework that supports, rather than derails, a woman’s athletic career to and through motherhood, sends a critical message to the rest of the working world -- if you can do this in sport, you can do it anywhere."
Our sights are set on this challenge as we kick-off 2022. While we continue our work to change the narrative around the value of motherhood and set new best practices for supporting the family journey + choices around athletic career and motherhood, we will also be initiating work towards establishing and standardizing these supportive structures and systems.
We know that the last couple of years has only fed the beast of gender inequity and the fight ahead is a fierce one. We also know that we are not fighting this beast alone. We will continue amplifying the good work of those in this fight with us while we collaborate and chip away at our own corner of the issue – our vision set firmly on a working culture where motherhood is not a limiting factor in how women succeed professionally or personally.
We appreciate your support as we continue down the road ahead! Thank you, all and happy new year!
Setting a New Gold Standard for Gender Equity in Sports
&Mother Publicly Releases Model Sponsorship Contract Provisions for Pregnancy and Parental Leave for Professional Athletes
BERKELEY, CA & SEATTLE, WA - NOVEMBER 17TH, 2021 -- &Mother, a social change nonprofit focused on gender equity and working motherhood announce the public release of recommended contractual provisions for sponsored athletes to support pregnancy, postpartum recovery, and parental leave. The initial goal of the work and public release is to provide an easily accessible, gold standard model for any athlete, brand, or agent to adopt. The Model Sponsorship Contract Provisions for Pregnancy and Parental Leave is available here.
Contracts between athletes and sponsors rarely make it into the public space, and there is no standard for including or adapting an adequate and appropriate pregnancy and parental leave policy for sponsored athletes. This lack of standards around sponsor support is a key barrier to the success of athletes, especially female athletes, who may or may not start a family during their athletic career.
Working with lawyer, Cynthia Calvert at Workforce 21c, the team interviewed stakeholders across the industry - from athletes to managers to brands - to arrive at concise, legal language that reflects both the unique challenges and opportunities for how athletes return to competition and other types of promotional work on a healthy timeline during and after pregnancy. In addition, the included parental leave clause contains language that applies to any gender and any family structure.
The United States is currently one of six countries in the world that lacks a federal paid leave policy. With ongoing discussion as to the extent to which paid leave will be included in the Build Back Better Infrastructure bill, having private companies step up to improve their own internal policies makes a critical statement. By adopting the Model Provisions or building on their own contractual clauses to support parental leave, leaders in the sports industry have an opportunity to elevate the conversation and set an important example of adaptive policies, especially for contractors and workers with physical job requirements.
“Having leaders in the sports industry standing up for better policy can open up space to talk about those who still lack access to these allowances.” said Annie Sartor, Senior Director of Business Partnerships at PL+US, a national campaign to win paid family and medical leave by 2022, “The policy language for athletes giving birth -- allowing more time and having physical accommodations for pregnancy and postpartum recovery -- is an important example for low-wage earners who also have physical jobs. Without similar protections, female workers leave the workforce and that results in a lifetime of reduced wage earnings.”
Eventually, &Mother hopes to see provisions for pregnancy and parenting become standardized in all contracts for both male and female athletes at any age or stage of signing in order to have a real impact on gender equality in sports.
“Asking for the word pregnancy to appear in a contract can feel like putting a target on your back.” explains Alysia Montaño, &Mother Co-Founder who wrote about lack of sponsor support for motherhood in a 2019 NY Times op-ed.“You can be a champion and a mother. There is no reason to push women out of the prime of their career if they decide to start a family. We need to break the assumption that a career ends when babies come along.”
Several brands have already demonstrated their commitment to supporting athletes’ parenting journeys, including ,Cadenshae, Altra, along with Burton, Athleta, HOKA One One, Picky Bars + Laird Superfood, Nuun Hydration, Rabbit, Oisell and Salomon. &Mother is encouraging other brands to show their support and commitment to working parents by signing onto the project here.
Athletes, agents, and brands looking to adopt the provisions or tailor their own contracts with essential elements of support can find the provisions here, alongside an overview of how and why to implement supportive language into contracts.
Excited to Announce Culturelle Probiotics, Boosting Our Support for Athlete Mothers Ahead of the Tokyo Olympics!
We are excited to announce that the Probiotic brand Culturelle® has joined in our efforts to break barriers that limit a woman’s choice to pursue and thrive in both motherhood and career.
Through the support of Culturelle® Probiotics, we will be able to expand our Maternity/Family-Support Grant Program for elite athletes and coaches who are mothers. The grant program is aimed at identifying and covering the often overlooked barriers and expenses that working mothers face when continuing and excelling at their careers -- including childcare, family travel, postpartum physical therapy, mental health support, lactation support, and everything in between. The grant program will initially focus on the athletes headed to the Tokyo games, with the goal of lowering the roadblocks that could affect a mother’s participation in this career-defining moment.
The Culturelle® Probiotics brand has taken a leadership position in helping women with health and wellness issues throughout the lifecycle of being a mother. Through the partnership and marketing efforts, Culturelle® Probiotics aims to increase the visibility of challenges all women face in the workforce, highlighting the impact of the global pandemic and the resulting amplification of disparities.
“The Culturelle Probiotics team is thrilled to partner with &Mother to shine a light on a cause that is both timely and worthy of national attention. As a brand, we have always believed in wellness in all aspects of life. By joining &Mother and their mission, we can directly contribute to helping incredible female athletes to reach their career goals without sacrificing life at home with their families,” said Maha Elkharbotly, President & CEO of i-Health.
“There are invisible barriers that women face when it comes to pursuing and thriving in both career and motherhood,” said Olympian and Co-Founder of &Mother, Alysia Montano. “Starting in Sports, we can make these barriers visible, set an example for how to overcome them, and make progress towards a world that values and elevates working mothers. Having a partner like Culturelle Probiotics helps us get one step closer to those goals."
We look forward to continuing our partnership through the 2022 Winter Games in Beijing and beyond.