Female College Athlete Says She Lost Scholarship as Coach Prioritized Trans Playerhttps://pjmedia.com/catherinesalgado/2026/06/11/female-college-athlete-says-she-lost-scholarship-as-coach-prioritized-trans-player-n4953879A college volleyball player says her coach promised her that her new university would be giving her a full-ride scholarship. At the end of the year, she said, she found herself saddled with bills, while her coach was uninterested in helping her but enthusiastically promoting a biological male teammate.
Elle Patterson told Fox News last week that she had switched from Fairfield University to San Jose State University, following her volleyball coach, Todd Kress, after he promised her on a phone call that she’d get a full ride to San Jose State, too. ... It seems he didn’t actually clear that with the university, and she didn’t even receive a partial scholarship from the university. To top it off, Patterson found herself demoted in favor of a biological male who identified as female.
Patterson’s family was sidelined by having to pay out of pocket, especially since she has three siblings. But they believed that the scholarship was merely delayed a year. This was again based on a promise from Kress, who, per Patterson, assured her, “We will not be covering your first year. But we will be covering your last three.” That didn’t happen either. Kress was again making an empty promise.
... “He didn't seem like the type of coach and the person who recruited me when he was actually coaching at San Jose," Patterson said. "The way in which he went about certain situations and just playing was more along the lines of just completely tearing you down as a person and not building you back up. But it definitely felt like he had certain people, one being the man on our team, that he would have done anything for... ... .
After she missed a few games due to an injury, Patterson said, “We go through the entire season. I get to my end of the year meeting with them. And that is when I was sitting in the office with him and the assistant coach at the time and they said that they weren't going to give me a scholarship anymore.” They claimed it was because of Patterson’s injury, but Fleming, who continued to receive his scholarship, missed even more games than she did due to an injury.
Even before I saw the uniform in the picture, I had a feeling this would be about San Jose State's women's volleyball team. Fairfield University is a smallish Catholic university in Connecticut. Transferring to San Jose State could/should have been a significant boost for Patterson in terms of staff support, learning from team mates, and learning from higher-level competition. Instead, it proved to be a very expensive (= out of state tuition) lesson in Prog priorities and, "If it isn't in writing it didn't happen."
