For the first time in the modern Olympics, women will be competing in wrestling. Here
August 4th, 2004
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For the first time in the modern Olympics, women will be competing in wrestling. Here
It’s worth pointing out that the two sports that “are added solely for their huge roster size” are also Olympic sports.
True. And therefore…what?
Consider. Lots of women run, but few schools add women’s track teams. Many women play tennis, yet schools rarely add those teams either.
Few girls row boats and yet more rowing teams are being added than any other sport, men’s or women’s. Why should these things be so? The answer has everything to do with the Alice-in-Wonderland world of proportionality.
Out of curiosity, Jim, have you ever been paid to lobby against Title IX? I don’t have any expectations one way or another, but I do note that you’re in the PR business and you worked on the Augusta case.
I can’t think of a major college in California without a women’s tennis team. For a few of the smaller schools, they are missing a lot more than tennis.
http://www.pbase.com/pj48/stanford_womens_tennis
Maybe tennis is being added at the same rate because 879 of 1024 NCAA schools already have women’s tennis. 701 have outdoor track and for all those women that like to run, 939 schools offer women’s cross country. It’s hard to add when it’s already there.
My comment about rowing and equestrian being Olympic sports was aimed at your complaint that Title IX is wreaking havoc with Olympic track. While that might be true if you want to go down that road you should probably admit that Title IX is also resulting in support for other Olympic sports, like equestrian and rowing (which is practiced by plenty of middle income people where I live).
Well, part of my practice focuses on public affairs in athletics. I have indeed had the National Wrestling Coaches Association as well as the College Sports Council as clients
Fair enough.
So how would you reform it? You’ve made post after post about Title XI, advancing a position that you are paid to advance. However, I haven’t seen any serious proposals for reform other than the soundbite “drop proportionality.” OK, then what?
Heck, you had the perfect platform in your interview with your client, Eric Pearson, who says “We take issue only with the way it is regulated.” But then he says that one out of the other two ways to comply with the law is “a sham.” Alas, you never asked the obvious follow-up question: “What are your recommended reforms?”
Are you saying that you’re in favor of Title XI, but that you think the law should simply force all colleges to add a woman’s athletic program once every five years?
What’s your plan, Jim?
To Ben’s points, he’s right
Gosh. Just think; if ASU had made the decision to have somewhat fewer than 70 players on the men’s football team, they might not have had to build those canals. (Looks like rowing is for men and women both, though.)
Does Title Ix apply to clubs like Arizona’s rowing club? I’m not asking to be a smartass. I really don’t know.
For the record, evry school that offers Div I bowling or equestrian also offers women’s tennis and track so those programs are hardly suffering at the expense of fringe sports. Of the 85 Div I schools that offer rowing 10 don’t offer track (men’s or women’s) and 4 don’t offer tennis.
Of the ones that don’t offer track most are either really small or urban. GW in downtown DC doesn’t have a track facility. Go figure.
And big surprise, a lot of the schools with equestrian programs also have vet schools.
As to the central issue of fairness, I agree. It’s foolish if programs are created just for the sake of having programs while others are cut despite overwhelming support for them.
On a side note, thanks for the posts on the subject. Despite going to grad school at a Div I institution I didn’t hear much about Title IX because I was at a private university that doesn’t rely on federal funding. Despite that they still have an equal number of mens and womens sports teams although there are likely more male than female athletes due to the football program.
Good grief, Bryant. For the record, Eric McErlain made it plain at the outset that I was invited in part for my, yes, professional expertise in sports and gender issues. That
I don’t see this particular “victim group” of wrestling coaches as sexist or Neanderthal-esque. But the fight (with its own compliment of whining and lawsuits) seems one waged by a fairly cynical bunch. At the end of the day, Title IX is a far more convenient target for them than football programs, many of them losing more and more money to chase the few programs that do well in that sport.
It’s wise on their part to play that reverse-discrimination card, and all the power to them, but ease up on the crusaders for justice stuff.
At this very moment, I buy Jim’s proposal with regards to eliminating continuing education students as part of the count. Not necessarily buying the football exception proposal.
By the way, I hope the bit about any connection between Tempe Town Lake and crew at ASU is a joke.
Last year the Title IX commission set up by the Bush Administration recommended many reasonable reforms. Unfortunately, the Administration completely caved in to the inside the beltway, pro-gender quota crowd and failed to change anything.
Most of the recommendations were along the lines of easing the current inflexibility of the proportionality prong–like excluding the “nontraditional” undergraduates from the gender ratio calculation. These are people not likely to play sports, like a 45 year old mother who has returned to school to finish up a degree that she may have started before starting a family. Other ideas suggested were simple, like not including “walk-on” athletes in the roster count.
The most obvious improvement would be to clarify prong three so that there is some universally recognized way to measure interest. In the Cohen v. Brown case in the early 90′s, Brown University tried to demonstrate to the court that it had indeed complied with Title IX by measuring and meeting interest, but the court refused to recognized their interest survey and just focused on proportionality. Since then, the message was clear that counting roster sizes is what athletic directors must focus on or risk getting sued.
What is missing in this discussion is the fact that where we are headed is even more frightening then where we have come.
Condsider – even though the NCAA has one thousand more women’s teams then men’s – NCAA male athletes outnumber female athletes roughly 217,000 to 161,000.
Percentage of college students that are female – 56% (notice there are no calls for quotas in college enrollment?).
Even after the considerable devastation in male sports that has already occurred we are not close to the proportionality utopia.
It is hard to see how anyone can avoid seeing that the inexorable drive for proportionality will – if not derailed – inflict enormous damage.
If proportionality continues to rule – we can attempt achieving the quota by adding 115,00 female athletes (and add about 7,000 NCAA womens teams) and not add any males. Anyone want to predict that as the likely outcome?
Or we can maintain 160,000 female athletes and eliminate 90,000 more males than we already have.
Both of these choices are extremes obviously – but so isn’t the proportionality standard imposed by our federal government and endorsed by the gender-quotas-in-sports-only advocates.
But Leo, we’re not going to get there because the quotas are, in fact, loosely enforced. I’ve heard straight from Julie Foudy’s mouth that they’re not the sole criterion. (That said, I’d still like to see the quotas taken all the way out just to set the record straight and take away whatever potential for abuse may exist.)
The fact that there are still so many more male athletes than female athletes after all these years is all the proof you need.
Jim, this has to be enough. As we get closer to the Games, I’m going to run out of time to copy-and-paste my remarks every time you post on the subject.
“Good grief”?
Look: you get paid to advocate the point of view which dominates your posts on this blog. No need to get so defensive. For me, absolutely, it makes your posts less useful — because while the New York Times may be biased, I can be pretty certain that you’re biased too. That’s sort of the result of taking money to advocate a given issue, even if it’s one you fervently believe in.
I like solutions 1, 3, and 5. I think you’d want to combine 5 with de-amateurizing the major NCAA sports (i.e., football, basketball, probably hockey, and maybe baseball). You’d also have to redirect the revenue from men’s sports into the hands of the people funding it, of course, but that probably goes without saying.
Solution 2 would work if you could find a scientific way to measure interest. This may be impractical. Note that some people are going to argue that interest is unduly affected by opportunities available, which I think is an argument that needs to be addressed even if I’m unsure about it.
Solution 4 struck me as goofy at first but maybe… basketball teams aren’t big enough to be an issue. Hey, you’re an expert — why /do/ NCAA football teams have 70 people on ‘em?
Beau, Julie Foudy is incorrect when it comes to Title IX enforcement. I enjoy watching her play soccer but don’t enjoy listening to her spout the Women’s Sports Foundation party line.
Proportionality is THE standard for measuring compliance. Roster management, capping men’s squad sizes, exists solely because of pressure to get an athletic department proportionate. In addition, the NCAA also applies pressure on schools to develop gender equity compliance plans. Each school must report their ratios and a plan or face sanctions from the NCAA. Recently, University of Northern Iowa received a stern warning from the NCAA that they may be barred from participating in their championships and sharing revenues. Look for programs to be dropped there.
In addition to pressure from the NCAA, is the threat of being sued by one of the many lawsuit factories that specialize in Title IX suits. Just check out the National Women’s Law Center at http://www.nwlc.org to see their current hit list of 30 schools out of compliance, which they define as not proportionate.
Then, of course, there is the threat of losing federal funds, which no school can afford to let happen. So if the Office of Civil Rights gets a complaint, a school has no choice but to do exactly as the OCR dictates.
Well, I have to disagree with the no corresponding sport for women comment, and I have photographic documentation:
http://www.pbase.com/image/29273552
One thing about women’s wrestling, I am all for it. It is a lot more common in the Middle East and Asia than it would be here. I could not see it being any more of a club sport on a US college campus.
Private funding for collegiate sports would open a can of worms. They need to find a way to exempt the teams that create revenue for the school from the quota.
How many womens programs generate revenue similar to mens football, basketball or baseball?
Unlike collegiate dance, nursing, elementary school teaching, et al which are heavily female majority – the only acceptable result in intercollegiate sports for the National Women’s Law Center, Women’s Sports Foundation, American Association of University Women, etc. is proportionality.
It is reason the Department of Education has structured the enforcement policy the way it has – it is not an unintended consequence. The universities understand that the interest and recent history prongs are nothing but thinly disquised quotas.
Julie Foudy is a severe disappointment. She is too bright to not know how the current proportionality interpretation targets males – particularly non-scholarship athletes. And she, more than most of her contemporaries in the gender quota camp, should be able to feel the pain of these athletes who, ironically, find a twisted Title IX interpretation ripping sports opportunities from them because of their male sex.
Even Cynthia Cooper, WNBA player/coach, who was a co-chair of the Federal Commission on Title IX was persuaded and came around to advocating some common sense reforms that would not hurt female athletes and would help men a great deal. But Ms. Foudy fought every effort at reform tooth and nail. It was sad to see someone like her – who should feel some compassion for her fellow athletes who happen to be male – with such a hardened heart.
Still waiting for someone to explain why it’s taking so long to get the proportionality to match up if the enforcement of the quota system is as overzealous as some have claimed …
(Again, I still want the quotas out, and I’d back some common-sense reform. Of course, I’d also question why a third-string tight end needs a free ride while other sports are splitting scholarships among Olympians. Yes, football generates more revenue than swimming, but Natalie Coughlin — whose scholarship status I don’t know — means more to Cal-Berkeley than most of the football players.)
Beau,
An honest look at how the current policy interpretation works leads one to the conclusion that any universitywhich is not proportional is behind the legal eight-ball. Schools have thrown in the towel and gotten proportional (by at least some elimination of male opportunities) and it is just a matter of time before more, and eventually all, follow-unless the proportionality standard is changed. Tens of thousands of opportunities have been lost – is there a minimal amount of blood that needs to be spilled before the threat becomes serious?
Perhaps the most morally indefensible phenomenon created by this twisted interp is the squad cap. How much does a college save by telling the swim coach he can only keep 22 male swimmers and not the 28 he wants? The answer is the cost of 6 speedo suits.
What a perverse incentive it is when it causes a coach to deny male athletes the opportunity to swim (because of their sex) which in turn DOES ABSOLUTELY NOTHING FOR FEMALES. If that doesn’t define bad interpretation of a law – nothing does.
Leo,
We’re talking past each other. I agree that it’s a bad interpretation. But as I told Jim earlier, I think the histrionics on this issue often blur the facts and weaken the case of those who could stand some common-sense reform.
Since I’ve been playing a logician in this thread, I’ll mention a fallacy of Foudy and company — they’ve dug in their high heels because of the slippery slope fallacy. They’re worried that if they open a crack in Title IX, the whole thing will crumble. Logically, that doesn’t make sense. But with all the hysteria and misrepresentation of the issue, they’re not going to trust people like Jim to back off after a few common-sense concessions. (After all this, I don’t think *I* do.)
Remember, though, it’s more than six swimsuits. It’s six plane tickets, especially in this era of conferences that span thousands of miles. Someone else would probably be able to add details about insurance and so forth.
Just like when you take a football team to a bowl game, it’s also the band, the cheerleaders, the well-wishers, etc.
In the interest of being positive, here are my proposals:
1. Weaken the quota rule AND don’t tie it so strictly to percentage of student body. If a student body is 65 percent female, the “quota” is still no more than 50 percent.
2. No more legal challenges from outside bodies. Instead, give students a chance to petition for the addition of sports. Set the criteria so that those students must be legitimate athletes who can demonstrate that they have played those sports at the level one would expect of an NCAA athlete.
3. Sports that generate revenue may exempt *some* of their scholarships — say, up to 20 football scholarships and four basketball (men’s or women’s). The argument in favor: A rising tide lifts all boats. The argument against exempting more: Again, Cal’s third-string tight end doesn’t deserve as much scholarship money as Natalie Coughlin.
“Natalie Coughlin — whose scholarship status I don’t know — means more to Cal-Berkeley than most of the football players”
I dont know. My little brother is a senior at Cal, have you seen their tuition checks the last few years? Arnold passing a law saying they could only raise it more than 10% once every other year is looked at as a positive step.
Raising cash is job 1 for a number of universities.
“Set the criteria so that those students must be legitimate athletes who can demonstrate that they have played those sports at the level one would expect of an NCAA athlete.”
I’m not so sure. What’s the difference between an existing team recruiting regular students on campus — for whatever reason, be it numbers or potential — and a prospective team from an “emerging” sport like crew fishing for athletes?
The 2002 NCAA titlist in the shot put — and now one of the top 20 in the world in that event — began outside of the category this proposed criteria would require. The track coach needed a thrower, and he stumbled over someone on campus who was female, big, and inexperienced, not altogether different from the pool of candidates for the average crew team just forming.
Like many of the equestrian/crew/bowling types, the woman didn’t really give much thought to being a college athlete until an outsider planted the idea in her mind. I don’t think there’s a difference between that outsider being a desperate track coach or an advocacy group using the law to pressure a university to desperately try to create that same opportunity, or at least awareness of it.
Chris — Fair point. I’d try to get walk-ons exempted as much as possible, even given my point above that they also cost money.
PJ — How much ad revenue is it worth to see Natalie Coughlin in a “Cal” swim hat? Compare that to the financial benefit of the third-string tight end. (Good school, btw — hope your brother enjoys it despite the cost.)
Beau,
First of all thank you. You may not know it but you have joined our side. By saying you favor reform of any kind you have joined the ranks of reasonable and informed people – and placed yourself in opposition to the NWLC, WSF, et al who maintain -
1) The reason more men want to- and do- play sports than women is because of discrimination.
2) The reason we know that there is discrimination is because there are more men playing sports than women.
-someone married to that kind of circular logic will never give up proportionality
But I would like to suggest you to try to leave the Division I moindset for a moment and join us in Division III – the Division where the most teams have been dropped since the 2000 olympics. “6 plane tickets”?- how about letting them sit on an empty seat in the van or bus? Also there are a number of males who are grateful for a chance to work up from the bottom (many of whom do) and will accept not being on the “traveling squad”. It is a fact that women’s squads in colleges are hard pressed to find like-minded candidates(that is “differences between males and females” rearing its ugly head). Insurance? Ask these guys if they would be willing to pay their own – unfair as it is many will say yes.
This issue is simply about the FACT that the law makes no real allowance for the possibility that males want to bust their butts in college athletics in greater numbers than females. No one has to make the judgement that male athletes are more dedicated, or skilled, or more in need than females. No one has to maintain that things cannot change. We simply ask the feds to concede that when more guys show up for sports than gals – mandating equal outcomes instead of equal opportunity creates the same disaster as it would in collegiate dance, nursing, or elmentary education, (or sports jounalism).