Pursuant to the Protecting Young Victims from Sexual Abuse and Safe Sport Authorization Act of 2017 (the “Act”), all national governing bodies (NGBs) must implement reasonable procedures to limit one-on-one interactions between an athlete who is a minor and an adult (who is not the minor’s legal guardian) without being in an observable and interruptible distance from another adult, except under emergency circumstances.
The Act authorizes the U.S. Center for SafeSport (the Center) to develop policies to prevent abuse within the U.S. Olympic and Paralympic Movement. To assist the NGBs with meeting their obligations under federal law, the Center has developed the Minor Athlete Abuse Prevention Policies, which are incorporated into the USTA Safe Play Proactive Policies.
The USTA Safe Play Proactive Policies include an Electronic Communications policy in which all electronic communications between an unrelated adult who has authority over minor athletes and one or more minor athletes must copy either the minor athlete(s)’ parent/guardian or another Safe Play Approved adult in the USTA program or tournament committee.
Therefore, all adults with authority over minor athletes (such as Tournament Directors), are required to copy either the minor athlete(s)’ parent / guardian or another Safe Play Approved adult (such as the Tournament Referee) on all electronic communications.
To ensure compliance, all email and SMS communications sent from the Serve Tennis system to one or more minor athletes will automatically copy an email address that will be monitored by the USTA Safe Play Office.
Should you have any questions, please contact safeplay@usta.com.