When Fear Conquers Culture
A cancelled football game involving Chicagoland team reveals flaws in adult leadership and need for student-based advocacy
(Photo Credit: Saint Viator High School)
A 21st-century phenomenon is the concept of ‘culture’ within an organizational structure. Whether it be a corporation or sports team, leaders quite often speak eloquently on how all roads to success begin and end with ‘culture’.
Round the clock social media applications allows for continuous streams of culture-in-progress.
Look at us…we are out in the community…our tribalism at work…making the world a better place.
One action, one hashtag at a time.
The intentions of the messaging are good and positive on most occasions. But there are times when the Twitter slogans don’t align with outcomes, when purpose conflicts with action.
This is the case with a cancelled football game involving St. Viator High School, located in northwest suburban Arlington Heights.
The Lions of St. Viator were scheduled to play St. Joseph’s Academy in Kenosha, Wisconsin Friday night (Aug. 27) in the 2021 season opener.
Mid-week last week, a source told The Kerr Report the game would be cancelled due to Covid concerns. I was the first to tweet the news out.
My attempts to follow up on the news directly with St. Viator went unanswered. Jason Kuffel, the school’s Athletic Director and Dave Archibald, the school’s Assistant Athletic Director and football Head Coach, did not return multiple phone calls/emails/text messages.
Friday, the Daily Herald published a story about the cancellation (with no attribution to TKR for breaking the news). Kuffel did speak to the Herald and said this:
By adhering to the Illinois Department of Health current guidelines, we decided not to travel to Wisconsin to participate in that game. We want to keep our community and our school as safe as possible so we can maintain in-person learning again this year.
In effect, Kuffel said the Lions cancelled their game because they are afraid to travel 45 miles on a bus (38 of those miles in Illinois) and by traveling across the border, the trip would somehow endanger ‘our community’ and prevent the maintaining of ‘in-person learning.’
(We’re assuming Kuffel is talking about Covid. There is no reference to the virus by Kuffel in the article. Chickenpox?)
Let’s presume it’s Covid. And I’m going to get to the public health obstacle cited by Kuffel in a minute.
First, back to organizational culture referenced in the beginning of this article.
Like thousands of other schools throughout the state, St. Viator touts its unique culture in all of its messaging.
From its website, when explaining its “Values”:
We foster success in life and prepare students to excel in college through academic rigor, engaging the intellect, creative collaboration, respect of individuals, embracing diversity and acceptance, and responsibility to oneself and others.
Or “Vision”:
all members of the Saint Viator family discern who God wants them to be, discover what the world needs, and transform the communities they encounter through empathy, action, and inclusion.
I have no reason to think all of these attributes are not practiced each and every day within the hallways at St. Viator.
But they screwed up here and ignored their own mission statements.
Rather than practice ‘engaging the intellect’ or ‘respect of individuals,’ as written on their website, they ran scared, appealing to not the intellect, but to Neanderthal thinking, which remains all-too-prevalent in Year 2 of Covid Mania.
Once again, its kids who get shafted due to the errors in judgment of adults.
Let’s examine the public health concern referred to by Kuffel in the DH article.
Another comment from Kuffel:
We are taking everything into account. We have to look at the whole picture. It is not an easy decision.
His comments are vague, without specifics. It’s hard to know exactly what ‘everything into account’ or what ‘the whole picture’ means (that’s bad reporting. But that’s not unusual with writers who agree with lockdowns and identify as Covid Warriors. They are Fauci-ites with an anxiety disorder, more comfortable when the world tells them what to do rather than ask why.)
Let’s start with the Illinois Department of Public Health.
The agency publishes guidelines for sports teams. In its latest document, it states the following:
IDPH recommends that before traveling for sports activities, teams review the most recent data on county-level transmission across Illinois or in other states. If playing outside of Illinois, teams should avoid travel to areas of higher risk as recommended in the IDPH Travel Guidance.
On August 11, the Cook County Department of Public Health (the governing public health body for Arlington Heights, located in suburban Cook County) added Wisconsin to its list of “COVID Travel Advisory” states.
According to a CCDPH “Travel Quarantine Guidance” document dated August 15, “all travelers returning to suburban Cook County from the designated states should self-quarantine for 14 days.”
How this information applies to St. Viator is this—if the football team travels to Wisconsin while suburban Cook County is under a travel advisory (that includes Wisconsin), all parties that make the trip upon return “should self-quarantine for 14 days.”
Should self-quarantine. Not must. Should.
From deeper in the CCDPH travel quarantine document:
Will the guidance be enforced?
No, unlike the City of Chicago, suburban Cook County’s travel guidance is our recommendation, and not an order. The health department will not be issuing fines or enforcing the guidance.
Bingo!
A ‘recommendation’ not an ‘order.’
Here’s how the quarantine ‘no enforcement’ is explained in the CCPH document:
Why isn't CCDPH enforcing the travel guidance?
CCDPH does not have the resources to enforce the travel guidance. We are working with state and local partners to elevate concerns, especially with large gatherings of travelers from the states with increases
For anyone interested in engaging in intellectual risk assessment, there’s the out clause—no enforcement.
By their actions, to cancel a football game, the administrators at St. Viator apparently aren’t interested in practicing the Viatorian faith preached on its website:
through study, prayer, and transformative action
Instead of trusting their own resourcefulness and problem-solving skills, they are running scared.
These are not qualities that befit a curriculum or culture that develops the “whole person.”
I’ve been a reporter for several decades in various capacities and in all forms of media.
People don’t talk to reporters for all sorts of reasons. It’s rarely ever personal. I’ve never spent much time thinking about it, as it’s a waste of time. Readers don’t care. They want information.
When sources won’t talk on the record, good reporters find someone else who will.
I reached out to one of the players on the Lions football team. His name is Alex Konopka, the team’s quarterback and one of five captains.
When we talked, Konopka was understandably disappointed by the loss of the game. Football players in Illinois are guaranteed nine games each season, everyone of them precious.
“It’s horrible,” he said.
(People say all the time, ‘oh, it’s just sports. Just a game. Health and safety matters most.’ Stop with the sanctimonious bullshit. They have no idea what they are talking about. Health and safety has nothing to do with it. It’s all fear and politics, courtesy of the Dark Lord.)
Here’s what Konopka told me.
He and another captain, Carson Eggebraten, were working out in the St. Viator weight room Wednesday night. Dave Archibald, the team’s head coach, walked in and told the players about the game cancellation.
“Me and Carson told the other captains but we were still processing it and we weren’t in the mood to talk about it,” Konopka said.
They sat on the information that night.
On Thursday, over a conference call with the rest of the team, the captains spilled the news about the cancellation. During the call, the captains emphasized staying positive and how Archibald and administrators were feverishly trying to find a replacement game.
While talking about the players only call, Konopka said:
“Coaches have been urging players to get vaccinated. Just for the safety of themselves, for their families and their schools so we can stay in-person this whole year.”
This was unprompted. I hadn’t asked anything about vaccinations at this point of the conversation (yet. I had planned on asking Konopka about the vaccine, only later).
The reference to ‘in-person’ from Konopka corroborates what Kuffel told the Daily Herald, how the school wants to “maintain in-person learning again this year.” Physical attendance is the main emphasis of school districts all over the state in reopening plans this August/September, more so than forced masking or even Covid testing.
It makes sense that Konopka would repeat what he’s been hearing all summer from school leaders, about the importance of preserving in-person schooling.
But I want to go back to public health travel guidance for a bit.
The CCDPH travel quarantine document refers to the Centers for Disease Control (CDC) when segregating the vaccinated and non-vaccinated.
According to the CDC, for the vaccinated, there are no testing recommendations for pre-or-post travel, only advice to ‘monitor symptoms.’
But for the non-vaccinated, its quite laborious.
Here it is, via the CDC website:
BEFORE YOU TRAVEL
Get tested with a viral test 1-3 days before your trip.
AFTER YOU TRAVEL
Get tested with a viral test 3-5 days after travel AND stay home and self-quarantine for a full 7 days after travel.
Even if you test negative, stay home and self-quarantine for the full 7 days.
If your test is positive, isolate yourself to protect others from getting infected.
If you don’t get tested, stay home and self-quarantine for 10 days after travel.
Avoid being around people who are at increased risk for severe illness for 14 days, whether you get tested or not.
Of course, as always, these are ‘recommendations’ not requirements.
Remember, the only comment we have from Kuffel or anyone at St. Viator about why it cancelled the Aug. 27 game is a hazy reference to how they want to keep the ‘community safe.’ We can only speculate that vaccine status, and the taxing testing regime for the unvaccinated, are part of the ‘whole picture’ Kuffel refers to.
But when Konopka said how he and teammates are being ‘urged’ by coaches to get vaccinated, I had to follow up.
I asked Konopka if he knew how many teammates were vaccinated.
“Out of 50, I would say maybe 35-40 kids,” he said.
If we go off of what Konopka said, approximately 70-80% of the St. Viator varsity football team is vaccinated.
Hesitancy from the unvaxxed teammates does not come up often in conversations according to Konopka. He said when it does, it’s “more of ‘hey are you vaccinated? They say ‘no’ and you ask ‘why not?’ And they are like, ‘my parents this and that.’ They won’t give you a straight answer.”
Konopka is himself vaccinated. He said his mother is a nurse and is “for the vaccine” but he cites his own reasons for being dosed:
“Just so life can get back to normal. So everyone can play football and other sports,” he said. “We’ve been sick of mask wearing for the past year and I think its getting old for everyone. It’s a big thing for us to go back to normal and hopefully for this to be behind us in the next year.”
A thoughtful, intelligent answer. I can see why Konopka was named a Lions captain. He’s an impressive young man and I’m sure, will have many collegiate options.
At the end of our conversation, I gave Konopka some advice—he should do a public service video and say just what he said to me. He should talk about life getting back to normal and what that would mean to his peers at St. Viator and those around Chicagoland and state.
We’d all prefer to hear more from young athletes like Konopka.
Because the adults keep dropping the ball.
Based on all of my reporting, here’s my conclusion about what happened with St. Viator and its Week 1 football game.
I think administrators higher up than Kuffel and Archibald pulled the plug. With school starting Aug. 18, influential members of the board of trustees, officials and parents got spooked, their discomfort kicking upstream to the school president (Rev. Daniel Lydon) and the game got flushed.
The travel advisory went into effect Aug. 11. I found out a week later they were cancelling the game. If it were really about that, wouldn’t they have called the game sooner and given them more time to find a replacement game?
No, once the fear-mongerers got control of the narrative, that was that.
(Legacy media brands like the Daily Herald are complicit. They swallow the anxiety Kool Aid a gallon at a time.)
If St. Viator is unable to re-schedule the game, the cancellation will be ruled a no-contest, according to IHSA football director Sam Knox. Knox said 'the no-contest’ ruling is because both teams agreed not to play.
On July 30, the St. Viator had what looks like a pretty good day.
In a Twitter post from @SVFootballCoach, the program talks up ‘mental toughness and tenacity’ after a summer practice day:
This all great stuff; programs talking up the ‘culture’ component I’ve written about in this article.
But when it came time for the adults in the room at St. Viator to put into practice what they preach—rewarding players with competition for all of their hard work—they failed the test.
That’s a shame for the Lions football players who keep getting kicked around by grown ups whom by now, should know better.
Covid isn’t going anywhere. Rather than find a way to co-exist with it, St. Viator gave up.
That’s not healthy or safe. That’s when fear conquers culture.
Late Tuesday, St. Viator did announce it had scheduled a Friday game vs. South Elgin.
For story ideas, article comments/feedback, media inquiries and more, drop note to jon@jonjkerr.com, or @jonjkerr on Twitter.
Great coverage of this story! I think much of the blame has to go to lousy governance in Illinois ---- as this is being decreed from above. All power all control all the time.
Thank you for an article that acknowledges what so many are afraid to speak. Change will come only when we are willing to advocate for a new narrative.