Alma College wrestling reborn

We've largely gotten away from correcting all the little mistakes, misinterpretations, and misrepresentations of Title IX that occur in the media.
But sometimes one of them just strikes that nerve and...
A story about the rebirth of intercollegiate wrestling at Alma College in Michigan says that the program was cut in 1984 "in large part because of Title IX." This bothers me for two--related--reasons. One, a majority of the wrestling community blames the enforcement of Title IX for its demise in the 80s. And two, Title IX was not being applied to athletic departments in 1984. The Grove City decision came down in 1984. No school is going to cut a program for Title IX reasons while a Supreme Court decision over whether it will have to or not is pending.
Wrestling advocates argue that wrestling is growing in popularity. And the numbers support this. But that does not mean it has retained a consistent level of popularity or support over the past 40 years. That some wrestling programs are being (re)introduced is indicative of the ways in which athletic programs change with the times. And this is a good thing.
The president and trustees of Alma College say that the time was right to reintroduce wrestling because of the benefits it will bring to the athletic department and the school as a whole.
They did a feasibility study. Which means they must have run the numbers I just did.
So Alma has a 105-member football team. (These are the latest numbers reported to the Department of Education.) This presents a certain amount of challenges especially when the student body is 58 percent female. They added 26 opportunities for men with wrestling. Fortunately they added 28 for women when bowling and lacrosse got put in place this year as well. So these new numbers added to the old numbers (in other words, this is approximate) look like this:
Fifty-nine percent of athletic opportunities at Alma go to male students. Prior to the addition of wrestling and women's lax and bowling this year men had 60 percent of the opportunities.
In other words, not much changed.
Alma remains in compliance under prong two. Still the implication that the wrong/discrimination men experienced when wrestling was cut in the 80s seems a little misplaced given that women then and now have fewer opportunities at Alma College.

Mankato cutting sports

Somehow it flew under our radar last fall that Minnesota State University Mankato was planning on cutting four sports: men's swimming/diving, women's bowling, and men's and women's tennis.
But they indeed were. And then the student-athletes and their supporters started a campaign to save their sports for at least three years by increasing student fees. The students voted on the non-binding referendum earlier this week. And it passed.
But the university president has opted to go forth with the cuts anyway--with one exception: women's tennis which is being kept for conference affiliation reasons.
Several years ago, I noted that Mankato had been considering cutting sports but opted instead to manage their rosters better and add a women's sport. They believed, at the time, that this would actually save money in the long run. It was a nice idea, but apparently it didn't work out. And the sport that was added--women's bowling--is now being cut.
No explanation from the president on why he chose not to follow the student vote. Title IX does not seem to be a factor in the cuts. Mankato remains in compliance with prong one.

Valparaiso to add two sports

Some schools taketh away and some schools giveth.
Pepperdine cuts two sports; Valparaiso adds three sports.
Not a lot of information here. Driven by student interest, the school has decided to add men's and women's golf and women's bowling.

Let men bowl!

I think the common perception of bowlers is of men of various shapes and sizes drinking beer in matching shirts engaging in some kind of male bonding away from women.
Basically men have access to bowling. Of course there are plenty of women's bowling leagues and mixed gender leagues as well.
But the discourse changes when we talk about intercollegiate bowling. Bowling is an officially recognized NCAA sport for women. But not for men. And what happens when a sport is being supported for women and not for men is that Title IX frequently gets cited as a quota system and an instrument of reverse discrimination that plagues our politically correct society.
Utter nonsense, of course. But those who are worried that male student-athletes are being denied their right to bowl can look at Viterbo University in Wisconsin, which has just added varsity bowling for both women and men.
The decision was motivated by the growth in girls' high school bowling in the state. No specific reason for why they added a men's team but the lack of varsity men's programs in the state mean that the team will largely be competing against club teams. I am not sure what it means to have a varsity sport for men that the NCAA does not recognize. But the male bowlers will benefit presumably from their status in ways their club sport peers will not.

Changes in Morehead State's Athletic Department

In an effort to increase opportunities for female student-athletes, Morehead State University, is reconfiguring its athletic department. What is especially interesting is how they are going about this. At UNH, OU, JMU all we heard about were cuts, cuts, cuts and the allegedly disparate effect on men.

But at MSU cuts is not a word we are hearing. MSU will eliminate men's and women's indoor track and field. But they are keeping men's and women's outdoor track and field. This means there are probably very few student-athletes who will be without a chance to play as most indoor athletes participate in outdoor track. Also, the men's and women's rifle team will be consolidated into a mixed team. The women's golf team is being elevated to varsity status. And, in the next few years, MSU has plans to add women's bowling and equestrian programs.

The story linked above is actually an MSU press release so obviously the insititution is not going to point out any negatives in this plan. But, from what I have read, this seems like a responsible and creative way to balance financial interests and limitations with gender equity.

Round up the posse!

Columnist David Whitley criticizes the status, conferred by the NCAA, of women's bowling as an intercollegiate sport as he recounts his search for the championship trophy in the halls of Vanderbilt University. (He never finds it--it seems to be off being cleaned somewhere.) He seems upset that the sport now "enjoys the same collegiate status as football." [Note: no intercollegiate sport enjoys the same status as football.]
And though Whitley claims to be all for women's equality and access to sport he sees the addition of bowling as evidence that "schools have turned sports into a semi-farce in order to stay ahead of the Title IX posse."
Why didn't anyone tell me there was a posse??

The aftermath

A picture is worth a thousand words. And if you look at this picture of Fresno State AD Thomas Boeh as he answers questions from the media about Title IX, gender equity, discrimination complaints, and adding more women's sports you can probably figure out what some of those words are.
The Fresno Bee reports that the university is considering adding new women's sports to equalize the amount of financial aid provided to female student-athletes. The school already offers the maximum amount of scholarships per sport mandated by NCAA so the only option is to add sports. Water polo, rowing, and bowling are all under consideration.
In other news that has come in the aftermath of the Lindy Vivas verdict: state Senator Dean Florez who has been leading the hearings on gender discrimination will visit Fresno State and talk to athletes and coaches; OCR officials have made some recent visits to campus though we don't know exactly why or what they were looking for as Boeh would not provide details of the visits.

"A different approach"

This article about the athletic department at Minnesota State Mankato illustrates that Title IX compliance doesn't always mean cutting sports.
In fact administrators at Mankato, who thought about cutting some men's minor sports to compensate for the growing roster sizes, figured that it could possibly cost them more to cut these sports in the long run as compared to the short-term savings.
Says Athletic Director Kevin Buisman:
"Ultimately, it was determined it would do more harm than good. We felt like we would alienate alumni, and when we looked at the cost savings versus the damage that would be done with our donors, we decided to take a different approach."
So the university added bowling and increased the rosters in other women's sports. The university gave them $500,000 to implement the changes.
And if you continue to read the article you will see that both the men's and women's programs at this DII school are doing very well since the decision.

Kutztown adds lacrosse and bowling

We talk a lot about Title IX compliance at Division I schools because of big athletic department budgets and successful teams and lots of scholarship dollars, but the issue of compliance certainly exists at Division II and III schools as well.
Kutztown University in Pennsylvania has just committed to adding women's lacrosse and bowling. Several years ago they added women's golf. Kutztown is citing compliance with prong 2, a history of expansion of their women's program but also notes that they need to bring their athletic department numbers more in line with their undergraduate population. Women comprise just under 60 percent of the undergraduate population but in 2005-06 had only 43.4 percent of the athletic opportunities. The new teams will add 40 opportunities for women athletes.
With the two added teams, Kutztown will be carrying 23 intercollegiate sports: 13 for women, 10 for men. Division II has championships in 25 sports. This is a fairly high number of teams for a DII school. According to this fact sheet, the average number of DII men's teams is 6.5 and women's is 7.2.
I commend Kutztown for continuing to seek compliance but I wonder how sustainable 23 teams are. Too many teams was JMU's problem as well. Granted the situation is different between DI and DII schools but adding teams to meet compliance standards only to cut them later because of financial issues can lead to even more Title IX backlash as we have seen with the JMU case.
Here's hoping Kutztown is able to provide good opportunities for all its athletes now and in the future.

Bowling Emerges

According to this article from bowl.com, Kutztown (Pa.) University will add women's bowling to increase opportunities for female athletes and retain its compliance status under prong 2.

Yes, the NCAA sponsors women's bowling.

Bowling (like ice hockey and rowing) is an alumna of the NCAA's list of emerging sports for women -- a list that now includes archery, badminton, equestrian, team handball, rugby, squash, and water polo. The NCAA recognizes these designated emerging sports and encourages their development by letting universities count participation opportunities toward sport sponsorship and financial aid minimums. Once the sport is developed enough for a national tournament, it graduates from the emerging sport list.

Bowling has had a national tournament for 3 years. Nearly fifty schools sponsor a women's bowling team. They may each award five equivalency scholarships. Bowling is the smallest sport to have "emerged" from the list, but if the others-- hockey (about 80 teams) and rowing (about 150 teams)--are any indication, Kutztown's competition will continue to expand.