Beyond Simone Biles & Others’ Career Successes, Biased Judgment Still Haunts Gymnastics Coach: “Say Something Crazy”

Pushing to add gymnastics to the athletics department of the historically Black colleges and universities was not an easy task. But an Amos P. Godby High School alumna was determined to get her way. Derrin Moore founded the Brown Girls Do Gymnastics organization in 2015 to help her cause and found success years later. But how did she took the initiative in the first place?

Her organization aims to give access to gymnastics to girls belonging to the black community and give them a more fair chance at success in the field. All this came about after a pivotal judging incident during a competition, left Moore unhappy.

Simone Biles’ close friend Jordan Chiles shared her involvement with Brown Girls Do Gymnastics. Derrin Moore, who also joined the podcast, recounted a moment at a rural Georgia competition where her team of brown girls was subject to biased judgment.

Moore proclaimed, “We were in rural Georgia and all of our girls did really well on the vault. I mean to the point that like at least two of the girls on that team had just won state competition the year before for vault you know… They’re vaulting and they keep getting the scores are super low like sixes and seven and I was like what is going on.”

Moore decided to confront the judge to ask him what was going on. Narrating the incident further, Moore said the judge, “tapped me on my hand. I always remember that part, it was like she’s about to say something crazy.”

According to Moore, the judge casually dismissed her concerns and patronizingly commented, “‘You know, don’t worry. You’re doing a really good job keeping these girls off the street.’ I was just like wait a second.”

This remark struck a nerve with Moore, highlighting the judge’s prejudiced assumption that these girls must come from troubled backgrounds. Moore emphasized, “Not that there’s anything wrong with it, but, you know, it was just like everybody comes from a different background,” noting that some of the girls’ parents were well-off. It is important to note that this bias existed despite the rise of gymnasts such as Simone Biles, Gabby Douglas and those who came before them from the black/brown community.

In the 2012 London Olympics, Douglas became the first African-American woman to win the individual all-around gold. By 2015, Biles was also a three-time World all-around champion, hence these biases wouldn’t have gone down well with Moore.

Frustrated but determined, Moore channeled that anger into creating Brown Girls Do Gymnastics, aiming to challenge stereotypes and provide opportunities for young girls in the black community in the sport.

The organization was founded as a subsidiary of Brown Girls Do, an Atlanta-based advocacy organization promoting Black women and girls in various fields. Moore approached TaKiyah Wallace, the founder of Brown Girls Do, about adding a gymnastics unit and the rest is history.

In 2018, Jordan Chiles, who had finished second in the individual all-around at the 2017 Nationals, picked Moore’s organization to offer her support. In the NBC podcast, she highlighted the reason behind her choice.

“I like giving back to my to any community um I’m a giver this is my love language so knowing that I have the ability to you know help fund or do do anything to support their Foundation definitely makes me feel in position to just give out the love,” Chiles said. The endorsement from a rising star like Chiles, motivated Moore further.

In 2020, she began pitching gymnastic programs to HBCU presidents and athletic directors, but was met with rejections. But Moore banging on the door and Fisk University answered in 2022.