Intramural Team Names

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Hi all,
Does anyone have any written guidelines or rules on 'acceptable' team names? We've posted the following but looking for insight from other schools that have tackled this already.

Each team name and logo is subject to approval of the Intramural Coordinator. When selecting a team name and logo, captains should ensure that:
• They are in good taste.
• They do not contain any profanity.
• They do not contain a person’s real name, unless that person is also a participant on the team or has provided written permission to the captain.
• If a ‘play-on-words’ is used:
o It is not offensive to any religion, gender, ethnic background, sexual orientation, or any other student group on campus.
o That switching of letters does not spell an offensive or profane word.
o The play on words has some relevance to the sport.
• Where a complaint is received regarding a team name, it shall be reviewed by the Coordinator – Intramurals & Special Projects or Associate Director – Recreation & Sport Clubs, who will hold equal discretion on the decision to change a team name.
• Teams are encouraged to seek guidance from the Coordinator – Intramurals & Special Projects, where they are ordering team uniforms with the team name or logo, if they have any concern about the permissibility of the name/logo. Uniforms that are deemed offensive will not be permitted to be worn, and any cost for those uniforms will be the sole responsibility of the team.

A touchy subject every year. We try to walk a fine line, but lately we have been forced to deny team names much more often. Students are always looking to find a way to sneak in a less than savory name, some are just more subtle than others. I really like the guidelines you have, and with your permission I would like to adopt the list with a few modifications for our needs.

Currently we try to be a little lenient if the team name is clever and corresponds to the sport at hand. There will always be judgment calls, but we try to allow some leeway to encourage creativity. Obviously the pitfall with showing any flexibility is some students will take it as a challenge to push your limits with each submission.

The following are names that were permitted, but certainly pushed the limits. They were relevant to the corresponding sport, so we chose to allow them:
"Sets on the Beach" Volleyball
"Crazy Pitches" Wiffleball
"Turn your head & Coughlin" Flag
"The Master Batters" 16" Softball

Other occurrences we simply modify the team name to fit our guidelines:
"Pull my Ditka" changed to " Ditka"
"Cunning Stunts" changed to "Stunts"

@Parliament

You're always going to have this battle. Unless it is grossly inappropriate, the team captain will always defend his/her choice of team name.

I went to a session at a conference once that touched on team names and how they lead to inclusion or non-inclusion, how they attract/detract females, etc.

We used to ask ourselves, "What would the chancellor of the university say if he/she opened the campus newspaper, and smack dab on the front page in bold letters is 'SUCK MY DITKA WINS IM CHAMPIONSHIP' ".

With that mentality, we have censored more team names than you could ever imagine, but it is done so with the integrity of our participants, program, department, and university in mind. Hate being the "bad guy" but I think it is a worth while battle.

We have taken it as far as to put all team names through Urban Dictionary - if anything and I do mean anything comes up, we censor it. I can't get called to the principal's office for having a TEAM SMITH or TEAM HARRISON. I definitely can for the DITKA one though.

Straight out of our Policies:
The Intramural Sports program reserves the right to censor any team name that is vulgar, offensive, derogatory,
or otherwise deemed inappropriate.

so vague enough that it can be applied to anything =)

Jon

We have similar generic language in our policies and we also put it in bold on the sport description page as a reminder. As everyone has said it's a fine line but along with Jon I also often remind myself that we have parents, siblings and children in our building and looking at our social media so I ask myself how I would feel about a parent or child seeing those team names as well.

This is what we just implemented at our college:

Team Name Guidelines
To preserve the professionalism and integrity of our Intramural Sports leagues & tournaments, Objectively Offensive team names are prohibited. Each team is required to provide their team name by _________________or prior to participation (I would give a time frame so they have time to make changes). The Student Activities & Wellness Department reserves the right to deny the use of a name, or to disqualify a team from participation in Intramural Sports leagues and tournaments for refusing to alter inappropriate names. The department reserves the right to change or alter your team name; all team names must be spelled out, and it is recommended that you select a short team name as acronyms are not permitted.

The criteria for the denying, or disqualification of a team name include but may not be limited to:
· Abusive, vulgar or profane language
· Sexual connotations
· References to drugs or violence

Please make sure that your team name DOES NOT contain Objectively Offensive language or expressions such as PROFANITY, or references to DRUGS, SEX, or VIOLENCE.

All teams must be in compliance of federal rules imposed on colleges and universities across the country. For more information on our college's policy please refer to http://www.southtexascollege.edu/about/notices/title-ix.html

In looking at your statements I think we should incorporate what you used as well to be a bit more specific: It is not offensive to any religion, gender, ethnic background, sexual orientation, or any other student group on campus.*

I don't feel the need to put it in written policy and if I did, I would just make it vague to provide flexibility in its application. I usually have a couple of my student employees look over the list of names with me to catch anything that could be harmful to someone's feelings or values. When they come up, we tell the team that they need to come up with another option and they have been receptive and understanding of it.

Can you turn off team images? Name change requests have to be approved but logos do not.