A tennis player's woes

Tennis player and Brigham and Young University sophomore Bradley Ferguson has a column in BYU's student paper about how unfair Title IX is. A regular varsity contributor to the tennis team, Ferguson receives no scholarship money. When asking his coach about this, the response he received was essentially "Blame it on Title IX." And he has, despite the facts that he himself reveals about the number of scholarships and opportunities that BYU football usurp.

Ferguson writes that there are women on the tennis team (which received 8 scholarships to the men's 4.5) who have never played a varsity match. [This is information he received second-hand, however.] He does not receive anything and plays all the time. He finds this unfair. He does not seem to question all the football players who are on full scholarship (and receive all the "perks" that big-time football programs provide) who will never see a minute of playing time. There are far more of these than there are non-playing women's tennis players.

Once again we see a situation where someone supports the "intent" of Title IX because "it's in the right place" but ultimately concludes that men's participation is ultimately more important.