2002 Alumni Spotlight: Emily Stauffer

When Emily Stauffer landed at Harvard University in the fall of 1994, head coach Tim Wheaton knew he had wrestled a prized recruit away from many of the women’s soccer powerhouses in the NCAA. He also knew the recruiting coup would propel the Harvard program to new heights.

What he didn’t know was that Stauffer would become a nationally known women’s sports figure in only a few short years.

Since those early days at Harvard, Stauffer has become a devoted advocate of cancer research, a relentless supporter for inner city public school systems, and a professional women’s soccer player in the newly formed WUSA.

But before she became all of that, she was just another little girl playing soccer in the backyard with her older brother and his friends. Stauffer spent much of her youth as many other kids do, trying her hand at different sports: basketball, track, ice hockey, tennis, and, of course, soccer.

“Anything went until I got to the age of 13,” she says. “Then I got really serious about soccer, and it started crowding everything else out.”

Stauffer went on to star in high school and was recruited by dozens of colleges. But in the end, she chose Harvard over Duke, Brown, and North Carolina. Like many other top high school soccer players in the U.S., Stauffer had to choose between joining the maddening conglomeration of talent being assembled every year in Chapel Hill, or playing for another school in an attempt to take down the women’s soccer version of Goliath.

Stauffer says, after making a recruiting visit to each school, the decision wasn’t as difficult as one would imagine.

“I went and visited Harvard and I felt very at home there. I really liked the people on and off the team. I really liked coach Tim Wheaton,” she says. “My recruiting trip to Harvard was not only fun, but I could just tell that I really fit in well there and would have a good time. And, on top of that, I took into consideration other factors besides just soccer. Although UNC had a much better team at the time, I knew I’d be happier on Harvard’s campus than I would be down at UNC.”

Stauffer’s choice of attending Harvard led to a rebirth of success for the Crimson program. Before her arrival, the Crimson had won three Ivy championships (in 1978, 1979 and 1981) and finished in the top three only twice in the previous five years. With the addition of Stauffer, Harvard won three championships in her five years on campus and finished second the other two seasons. The Crimson’s Ivy League record in that time frame was 30-2-3. Ironically, Harvard also faced the UNC program that Stauffer spurned in the quarterfinals of the NCAA tournament in 1997--in what would have been Stauffer’s senior year. However, Stauffer was watching from the sidelines.

In the summer of 1995, her older brother Matt was diagnosed with Leukemia. Emily, who was two years younger than Matt, always had her older brother around when she wanted to kick the soccer ball in the yard. She recalls him as her best friend, and a driving force in her soccer success.

In the summer of 1996, Stauffer donated bone marrow to Matt after chemotherapy failed to relieve Matt of the Leukemia. Matt relapsed a second time in 1997, and Emily once again donated bone marrow&emdash;this time a more aggressive attempt than the first.

Emily took off the 1997 fall semester (and soccer season) to be by her family’s, and her brother’s, side. Although she missed that NCAA tournament game against North Carolina and Harvard’s Ivy championship that year, there would be other soccer accomplishments to celebrate. But no one could ever take away the time Emily got to spend with Matt in the final months of his life. Matt eventually lost his battle on Jan. 10, 1998.

Even though he’s now gone, Stauffer remembers him with fondness.

“I always feel like my brother is never very far from me. Anyone who has ever lost somebody knows they’ll have a part of them missing,” she says. “You’ll have your times when you’ll feel sad. But you learn to celebrate the moments you’ve had together. You learn to remember the people you love with joy, as well as sadness.”

These family experiences helped lead Stauffer to donate much of her time to an organization called “Evening With Champions.” The event is a figure skating gala produced by Harvard to benefit the Jimmy Fund at the Dana-Farber Cancer Institute and normally draws some of the best figure skating talent in the world. Stauffer’s brother had been treated at the institute for two and a half years. She spent a lot of time there, and became familiar with the institute, the doctors, and the research that was going on with the institute. Stauffer acknowledges her closeness with the Institute and its people when speaking about her help with “Evening With Champions.”

“It was meaningful especially to me because my brother had been treated at the Dana-Farber Cancer Institute,” she says. “And so I knew first-hand where this money was going, how much it was needed, and what all the hard work was for. It was really special for me to be a part of this.”

Her Harvard soccer family was right there with her during these tough times, and even though she suffered through tremendous personal pain, she remembers her days at Harvard with absolute enjoyment.

“They were some of the best years of my life. And more than any other reason, because I was on the Harvard women’s soccer team,” she says. “I think there are a lot of dynamics there, and one is the women on the team are some of my favorite people in the world. Not only incredibly driven, not only really good soccer players, but just really hilarious and very fun. And it was a family. We all took care of each other. Our real families from back home used to come to our games and there would be a reception after every game. It’s a unit that gets bigger and bigger every year, but keeps the same sort of close-knit feel to it. That was the number one reason why I loved playing there.”

Stauffer also credits head coach Tim Wheaton as a driving force in the program’s success.

“Tim Wheaton is one of the best coaches in the nation…and an excellent recruiter,” she says. “He has to be really resourceful and commit to people who understand that the sacrifice they make forgoing a scholarship to come to Harvard is an investment worth making. Not just playing for the Harvard women’s soccer team, but just in the payback you get from an education at Harvard. So I think Tim puts together really good teams. While I was there, and still, we compete with the best teams in the nation. And every year it battles for the Ivy championship and battles to get into the tournament. Harvard’s in the mix every year.”

Indeed, since Stauffer’s arrival Harvard has been in contention for the Ivy championship every year, starting with the Crimson’s first Ivy women’s soccer championship in 14 years during her sophomore year at Harvard. Although she may be reluctant to take credit for this renaissance, Stauffer notes that that first championship was a real turning point for Harvard women’s soccer. It remains her top memory of playing for the Crimson.

“That was sort of the beginning of a nice little dynasty we had there,” she says. “I think that after we won that Ivy League championship and established ourselves as the best in the League, Tim (Wheaton) really took the recruiting to a new level. And then in the next three years, we got some of the best players in the country to come to Harvard.”

Stauffer graduated from Harvard as, certainly, the finest player in Harvard history and arguably the greatest player in Ivy League history. The four-time All-Ivy performer was the 1994 Ivy League Rookie of the Year and the 1995 and 1996 Ivy League Player of the Year. She remains the program’s career assists leader (36), is third in career points (110), and was a finalist for the Herman Award and MAC Award--awards honoring the best collegiate soccer player in the nation--in 1996, 1997 and 1998. In addition, Stauffer was a finalist for the 1998 NCAA Woman of the Year and was the 1998 NSCAA Scholar Athlete of the Year. She was also a three-time All-American, a two-time Academic All-American, and a two-time Academic All-Ivy selection.

While Stauffer excelled for the Harvard soccer program, she had another program in the back of her mind since her sophomore year of high school. Back in 1992, Stauffer read a feature on Wendy Kopf in Time magazine that recognized Kopf as one of the most influential young people in the United States. As her senior thesis, Kopf had written a template for a teaching program that would help develop urban school systems throughout the U.S.&emdash;a program called Teach for America.

“It’s always been on my mind that America was this truly spectacular country and it didn’t make sense that our urban schools couldn’t keep pace with the suburban ones. That was an inequality that didn’t need to be there,” says Stauffer. “And it would be remedied if you put good minds and good people’s energy to work. And that’s what Teach for America is doing.”

Stauffer thought about doing a number of other things after graduation from Harvard, but nothing stuck with her like the Teach for America program. After she graduated from Harvard Stauffer didn’t apply to any graduate programs, she didn’t go through recruiting with other companies, and didn’t take any admissions tests. She applied for the Teach for America program and started at a Jersey City, N.J. public school in June of 1999.

Stauffer has many fond memories of her two-year stint as a public school teacher for a third grade class in Jersey City.

“I loved every second of it. It was incredibly challenging. You just sort of get dropped in and you have to hit the ground running,” she says, laughing. “But you can’t because you don’t really know how to be a teacher yet. It was definitely a slow start.”

Stauffer had overcome plenty of obstacles in her life up to this point, and was not about to let a rocky start in a classroom spoil the great things that were sure to lay ahead.

“I really had to learn, not only how to get the lessons across to the kids, get them excited about learning, get them acquiring the skills they needed to learn, but also just to get them to sit down,” she says with a chuckle. “It was harder work than playing 90 minutes on the soccer field, that’s for sure.”

However, after Stauffer got her feet wet, she gradually learned how to become a teacher and built and wonderful relationship with the students.

“We got going and did some great work,” she says. “And the next year I came back in September and was a completely different teacher. Not to say that I was a masterful teacher then, but I had a year under my belt and I knew a lot more about what I wanted to accomplish in the classroom. And we had just a great year. I still talk to all my kids.”

After two years of learning, Stauffer wasn’t sure who was teaching whom.

“I probably learned just as much as they did.”

Her story of triumph was also chronicled by two major newspapers last year&emdash;the Boston Globe and the New York Times. Although Stauffer is used to media attention in her life, she sees it as a way to spread a message.

“I really enjoyed seeing my little kids from Jersey on the cover of the Boston Globe,” she says. “I thought that that was really special. And I think the more you get the message out about urban schools and Teach for America, the better. And so, if people want to use me because I play soccer at the same time, that’s great. These kids are eight years old, they’re on the front page of the Boston Globe, you know? I’m sure they’ll be on the front page of a newspaper again, I expect great things out of them.”

It was late in Stauffer’s second year with Teach for America when she got a surprise phone call from Pat Farmer. Farmer, the head coach for the New York Power of the newly formed Women’s United Soccer Association (WUSA), invited Stauffer for a tryout with 24 other potential players for the Power. Stauffer whipped herself into shape as fast as she could, running and playing soccer on the weekends and after school. After a good open tryout, she was one of four picked to join the rest of the 24 drafted players in San Diego for another tryout. The first tryout was to preliminary cuts. The second tryout was to make the actual Power squad.

“I couldn’t be in San Diego for about a month because I was teaching,” she recalls. “So I worked as hard as I could back in New Jersey to get in shape, get my touch back, and get my game back on.”

Since she wasn’t with the team full-time, Stauffer would fly out to San Diego on the weekends and play in a couple of games. At a serious disadvantage against the competition, Stauffer knew she would be fortunate to be considered.

“I did my best to play hard, and left the decision-making up to the coaches,” she says. “If they wanted to take a chance on me, that was great. And if they didn’t, I was not going to regret the effort that I put into it.”

Stauffer made the team, and ended up starting in the New York Power’s first-ever game. Although still teaching full-time, she was able to practice with the team in the week leading up to their first game because her school was on spring break. However, after that initial game, it was a long wait before her next chance to get on the field.

“School wasn’t out until the end of June,” she says. “So I didn’t practice and I didn’t touch the field in game time for about three months.”

After school let out for the summer, Stauffer was able to practice with the team full-time and slowly worked her way back into the lineup.

“I didn’t travel with the team for awhile,” she says. “Then I wasn’t off the bench for awhile. Then, gradually, I came off the bench. Then I was the first off the bench. Then I went to starting a couple of games. And then it was sort of up and down from there.”

Stauffer’s Power squad went on to the first-ever WUSA playoffs, where they lost to the Bay Area CyberRays, 3-2, in the semifinals. A key starter and contributor in their playoff push last year, Stauffer hopes to make the Power roster again next year. However, she sees a greater goal on the horizon.

“I’d like to continue to play as long as it’s a growing experience, and for as long as I can offer something for the league,” she says. “But my ultimate passion is public education. That’s the thing I’d like to see change in my lifetime, to see the vision of Teach for America actually come true. To get those urban schools on par with, if not better than, the suburban schools. I think that’s a realistic goal for our country and that’s something that really needs to happen if we’re going to remain a fruitful country that likes to espouse the values that we do and the quality of opportunities that we like to talk about.”

As a soccer player, an advocate of cancer research, a teacher for an inner city public school, a professional women’s soccer player and a role model, Stauffer knows first-hand the positive effects of playing sports throughout life.

“I certainly think (playing sports) has taught me a lot,” she says. “My teammates and I had this discussion not too long after the end of the season last year. We started talking about what it’s meant to us and how we value how strong we are. We value how we know that when you get on the line and you’re going to run ten 120’s it’s going to be a hellish, awful experience. But you know you’re going to do it. You don’t doubt that you’re going to get it done no matter how much pain you’re in. It ends up sounding trite after awhile, but the lessons you learn on the playing field you can apply to other parts of your life. There are a lot of skills you learn playing soccer that are life skills and are not just about kicking the ball. I think everybody who’s played sports seriously in their life has learned something from that experience that they can take with them.”

--by Nathan Fry