The story behind the Adrian College complaint

The woman behind the 2007 complaint against Adrian College (which OCR found to be out of compliance in 8 program areas) spoke recently at a Michigan chapter of the American Association of University Women. Molly Ziegler-Moore, an Adrian College alum and former coach, presented her version of the events leading up and during the OCR investigation of the school. We have noted repeatedly that Adrian College was one of the most egregious examples of violations that has been brought to light (click on the Adrian College tag for our many posts on this). I don't think we realized just how much was going on before Ziegler-Moore decided that simply pointing out the inequities to administrators was not going to work.
We highlighted the multi-sport complex that lacked a women's locker room (an administrator told her "oh, it's in there"). A year later the hockey arena the hockey arena was built. It had a women's locker room but it was smaller with inferior amenities. When the college announced it was building a $2 million baseball complex, Ziegler-Moore--the softball coach--was promised her team would also get facilities. But when listing all she desired for the new complex softball would receive--like no more port-o-potties--she was told the softball complex costs were being capped at $200,000. So she asked one of the school's VPs if this was Title IX compliant. "Probably not" was his response.
I often discuss in my classes how discrimination can be subtle, sometimes even unintentional.
Not always, apparently.
I think Adrian College got off pretty easy on this one; largely because most employees were scared and Molly Ziegler-Moore was not out for for any kind of vengeance or compensation for the mistreatment of her or her athletes or female student-athletes as a whole. She just wanted the school to follow the law.

Later, after compiling a “wish list” of improvements to replace the portable johns that female softball students were using, she learned that they would not be the same. The new softball complex would cost only $200,000. So she asked a vice president, “is that Title IX compliant?” #“Probably not,” he replied.

Read more at: http://www.monroenews.com/news/2012/nov/14/monroe-woman-details-fight-gender-equity/

Later, after compiling a “wish list” of improvements to replace the portable johns that female softball students were using, she learned that they would not be the same. The new softball complex would cost only $200,000. So she asked a vice president, “is that Title IX compliant?” #“Probably not,” he replied.

Read more at: http://www.monroenews.com/news/2012/nov/14/monroe-woman-details-fight-gender-equity/

Later, after compiling a “wish list” of improvements to replace the portable johns that female softball students were using, she learned that they would not be the same. The new softball complex would cost only $200,000. So she asked a vice president, “is that Title IX compliant?” #“Probably not,” he replied.

Read more at: http://www.monroenews.com/news/2012/nov/14/monroe-woman-details-fight-gender-equity/

Another side of the story that Ziegler-Moore presented was about her own experiences confronting administrators prior to filing and her relationships within the school after she filed. She said she left due to the chilly environment after 15 years with the school and now works outside of sport. Colleagues did not want to be seen associating with her. She knows that had she stayed and been fired (a not-so-unlikely possibility), she could have filed a retaliation lawsuit. But her motivation for filing was to make the school a better place for all students; to make it a fair(er) institution. Of course people at the school resent the money that has to be spent to remedy the discrimination and probably the attention their combination of ignorance and willful discrimination garnered. Discriminatory practices may have changed, but have attitudes?

Resolution Agreement Reached at Adrian College

An anonymous reader mailed me a copy of a Resolution Agreement between the Department of Education Office for Civil Rights, and Adrian College in Michigan. In 2008, we blogged about ongoing investigation into a complaint against the college stemming from among other things the college's failure to include a women's locker room in its newly constructed "Multi-Purpose Stadium." (see here and here). Apparently, the inequities between men and women's sports at Adrian College were significant, as the college has agreed to remedies in every area covered by Title IX's athletic regulations. Specifically, the college has agree to:

• Evaluate its intercollegiate athletics program "to identify one or ore women's sport team to add in the 2012-2013 academic year."
• Develop a written replacement schedule for equipment and supplies, including uniforms, which will ensure equity by gender.
• Increase the number of competitive events for softball and women's tennis.
• Ensure that women's softball is not the only team stuck with 6 am indoor practices, but that that burden is shared by men's teams as well.
• Ensure that the head coach for men's and women's track splits his time equally between the teams, and to hire an assistant coach for women's track.
• Improve hiring practices to attract more qualified coaches to the women's program, including by increasing compensation and other conditions of employment to make the job more attractive to qualified applicants.
• Construct a new locker room for women in the Multi-Purpose Stadium.
• Renovate existing women's locker rooms in other facilities.
  
• Renovate the women's softball facility to allow for night play, concessions, changing areas, and spectator viewing.
  
• Assign the same number of "equivalently qualified" medical and training staff to men's and women's games.
• Provide equivalent publicity ("e.g., media coverage, statistics maintenance, attendance at games, and other services") to men's and women's teams.
• Provide recruitment funds to men's and women's teams "in proportion to each gender's participation rate in the athletics program" and, as needed, to the women's program at a greater rate in order to make up for the "significant" underrepresentation of women in the athletics program.
• Adhere to various reporting and monitoring requirements with respect to these promises.

OCR will continue to monitor the agreement until it determines that the College has fulfilled its terms.

Specifics of Adrian College complaint

A couple of weeks ago investigators from OCR showed up at Adrian College to look into the gender equity complaints that have been filed against the college's athletic program.

Since then more details about the complaint's allegations that there has been different treatment of women's and men's coaches, access to facilities and equipment and, in general, greater attention to men's athletics have come out.

But the college's executive vice president* Rick Creehan, who has been the spokesperson on this issue, has said that the complaints have been over exaggerated.

For example, the fact that the new Multisport Performance Stadium does not even have a women's locker room let alone one with lounge furniture and a plasma television as the men's does was simply an "oversight" according to Creehan. They must have just forgotten that women play sports for the entire time the project was being planned and executed. Forgetting to order a chair for the ticket booth is an oversight; forgetting to build a women's locker room is discrimination.

Creehan attempted to diffuse that particular complaint by noting that the Merillat Sport & Fitness Center right next door has a women's locker room. Such a rationale only makes the absence of one in the new building all the more egregious. That a university could build, in the past, a facility that women could use but forgets that women may want--actually are required to have--access to the new facility is not earning points for the administration.

Also at issue are: updates planned to the baseball stadium that are more extensive than those planned for the softball complex; male athletes' greater access to athletic trainers; more publicity for men's sports.

No word on when OCR will issue its report.

* I know the American university is becoming progressively corporatized but an executive VP!?

Adrian College under investigation

Adrian College in Michigan is under investigation for two separate Title IX violations. Complaints received in May and September are being looked at by OCR and, according to the article, are based on facilities including locker rooms, access to coaching, publicity, support services, recruitment, and equipment and supplies. No word on when the investigation will be complete and no comments from school officials as of yet.