Title IX I just now went to the Womens Sports Foundation website and filled out all the blanks to have an email sent to the President and my elected congressional representatives. The email was asking that Title IX not be changed to the disadvantage of women's sports. If you feel the same way, please do the same. (At least, those of you who are of voting age.) Here's the link: http://capwiz.com/wsf/home/ I believe the Commission is going to recommend to water down the support for women's sports. And I wanted to register my disapproval.
I disagree. I think the law should be changed. It's the one issue I've ever agreed with Republicans on. I don't consider sports to be an "educational" opportunity. I can't speak for other schools, but at the University of Iowa tax dollars do not support athletic scholarships. They are privately funded by outside people/organizations. Our athletic programs makes lot of money so they should be able to decide how they spend that money. At the U of I every single men's sport has walk ons. Tight end of the year Dallas Clark stated out as a walk on. Before I'm raked across the coals I'm not advocating Title IX be scrapped. Just changed a bit. I think if we had a rule that banned cutting men's sports to comply both sides would be happy.
I'm surprised to hear that the athletic scholarships are not funded by the school. Does anyone know if this is customary at most state supported schools, or unusual? And do the schools want outside individuals or groups determining the school's policies? How about the other athletic expenses? Coaches, equipment, transportation, medical personnel? Any taxpayer money there? I know this is simplistic, but it seems to me that the athletic scholarships should be divided among the men and women according to enrollment. Let's say the school population is 50-50. And let's say there are 300 scholarships (I just made up that number. I have no idea how many there are on the typical big campus.) Then it seems to me that 50% of the scholarships should go to men and 50% should go to women. However the men want to divide up their 150 scholarships is up to them. If they want 110 for football, 15 for basketball and 25 for all their other sports, that's their affair. Or if they want 80 for football, 15 for basketball and 55 for golf, tennis, wrestling, etc., that's also up to them. And how the women want to divide up their 150 scholarships is up to them. Sometimes people say there is less interest on the women's part. These opportunities have been available for only 30 years, and I believe the interest has enlarged tremendously in that time. But 30 years is still a short time. Let's see how much interest there is after 100 years of opportunity. And if the interest is not there among the women, then some other arrangements could be devised. For instance, for each scholarship which goes unfilled--for lack of interest--the men could be awarded an additional scholarship the succeeding year. Something like that would tend to track the interest on the women's part.
jo Jo, your response is a banner for title ix. I could not have said it better myself. One of my daughters is an athlete, the other is not. I to believe that the longer the opportunities exist, the greater the interest will be among women/girls. It is unfortunate that certain males sports are hurt, but you made a tremendous statement...however the men choose to use there scholarships is up to them. It is not a men vs women thing here. I have read a lot on this subject, but you response was so dead on. Thanks.
Well, it must be officially the off season now. The Title IX equinox has passed. We've covered this ground many times. I believe that Title IX has generally done what it was intended to do. I think that our thinking about it needs to be adjusted from time to time as circumstances change. I don't think that we need to revisit the arguement of whether or not it should exsist, but it would be interesting to see what the proposed changes and their impacts are. Jo, I'll visit your site and voice my support for Title IX.
I too would agree that Title IX should not be scrapped at all, but revised to disallow schools from cutting men's programs to be compliant...... that is abosolute crap! Just like sticking general ed or learning disabled students in an Honors classroom, you are seeking to find a lowest common denominator just to make everyone FEEL good. Women's sports are boring in comparison for most spectators, and are just never going to bring in the type of money or interest that make men's sports so big. That said, women and girls should have every opportunity to play sports for all of the more important reasons we play them like learning to be part of a team, learning to lose with dignity, and other myriads of life lessons. But taking away from one to give to another is wrong! Especially when we DO have the money in this country full of sprots junkies to provide programs for both sexes.
To say that women's sports are boring is naive and makes the rest of your argument obsolete. I believe women's tennis is more entertaining than men's. Same for Women's volleyball, women's soccer, and gymnastics to name a few. Your opinion is not the opinion of everyone. Besides, do you think the men were always this exciting to watch? Or have they gotten more exciting after years and years of opportunities? Should the women not be afforded the same opportunities to get there? By the way, I am a male.
So?? No one cares what your gender is. If your ideas are sound, it should not matter what your race, religion, or national orgin is either. To judge an arguement on that basis is a disturbing new phenomenom. So you like women's sports. BFD, so do I. Unfortunately, most women's sports do not generate the interest at the market level that men's sport generate. When this arguement is applied to scholastic sports ( including college ) it is a non sequetor. The benefits of competition at that level are part and parcel of a well rounded educational experience and thus should be protected regardless of gender. This makes where the money is earned irrelevent. All the funds earned by a college or university go into that entity's budget. Cost centers are simply an artificial distinction. If athletic opportunities are part of the institution's mission, then the money needs to be found somewhere. Title IX should not apply to professional sports, where the goal of the organization is to make money. If women tennis make less than men, it is a matter of negotiation, not law. I think the adjustments proposed are designed to allow football to exist separately from the rest of the athletic participation numbers. I think that this is O.K. if women's opportunities are not diminished or if it helps those organizations which are trying to comply. If the proposals diminish opportunity or provide cover for neanderthal organizations, they should be rejected.
Title IX is worded unfairly I cannot agree with Title IX remaining the same. I have done a lot of research on the topic and it is simply unfair. I am a big fan of female athletics also. I will almost drop everything if there is a women's soccer match I want to see and can go to. Yet the main reason Title IX was started was to give equal opportunities for women in education and female student athletes. It has done more than that now though. While I do believe more women will show an intrust in athletics while they have the opportunities. There is still a lot more intrust in athletics among the male students at any level in school. I was very happy when president Bush appointed a committee to look at Title IX. They won't do anything but maybe change the wording of Title IX which is want I would like. I am a student at Arizona State, and I am a huge fan of the women's soccer team. Yet there are two more female athletic teams there than there are male athletic teams just because they percentage of women enrolled must equal the percentage of athletic teams there. I think it is very unfair there is no college soccer team at Arizona State when there is by far a large intrust there.
I strongly discourage everyone from submitting anything from the Women's Sports Foundation web site. The WSF is using deceptive statistics to manipulate the public into preserving Title IX as it is. I encourage everyone to submit well-informed letters to the commission, not ones shrouded by ignorance. I support Title IX. I strongly support women's sports. I also have seen that the current interpretation of Title IX creates perverse incentives for school's to cut men's sports and there's no reason it has to be that way. Read this letter from USA Wrestling: http://www.themat.com/pressbox/pressdetail.asp?aid=6436 While I strongly disagree with its recommendation of using interest surveys for anything, it's dead on with it's assessment of how the WSF is using deceptive statistics. A quick example of the perverse incentives of Title IX's current interpretation: suppose a school has the resources to fund two women's teams and it can only get into compliance through prong two (having added women's sports teams recently). IF the school adds both teams right away will be ruled of compliance within three years. The school that adds one team, waits three years, and then adds the other, will be in compliance for six years. Does this make sense? No.
This morning I was at my alma mater's budget hearing that was presented in front of the Joint Finance and Appropriations Committee of the Idaho Legislature and the athletic budget for last year amounted to $11 million with $2 million of it being state tax money. The remaining $9 million was from donations to the department by individuals like me.
There are some articles on the NCAA website about Title IX, which is evidently a hot topic once again. Update on Title IX panel attracts large and interested audience The NCAA News -- January 20, 2003 BY KAY HAWES Title IX tonic may be football's business BY MARCIA FEDERBUSH The NCAA News -- January 20, 2003 '60 Minutes' flunks latest Title IX exam BY NANCY HOGSHEAD-MAKAR The NCAA News -- January 6, 2003 It must really be the off-season if I'm responding to a Title IX thread but, having followed the link to the USA Wrestling website, I have an opinion about the letter by Gary Abbott of USA Wrestling. The tone of the first few paragraphs speaks for itself. Abbott uses all the buzz words in describing those who disagree with him: "special interest groups", "harassing", "intimidate" and "threaten", "well-funded national media campaign" and "hoping that they can buy the results". The pot calling the kettle black? What is USA Wrestling if it isn't a special interest group? (If you're wondering about that, and you have a lot of time, read their Title IX Timeline. It also speaks for itself.) Thankfully, Abbott doesn't continue in that tone. After the first few paragraphs, there's a long and more reasoned discussion, hardly any of which is compelling, little of which is new, all of which is one-sided. Back in the 70's, when Title IX was passed, the fear-mongerers predicted that it would be the end of college and high school athletics. It hasn't happened. For the most part, schools have added women's sports without cutting men's sports - this despite having the burden of the "5000 pound gorilla" which, as we all know, is football, which has 85 scholarships - (that's about 8 soccer teams). Football makes Title IX compliance difficult for the football/basketball schools, so many of these schools have added women's soccer. Some non-revenue-producing men's sports get cut, and it's easier to blame that on Title IX than it is to look at football. Men have opportunities to get scholarships, as long as they play football. It's not fair, but Title IX doesn't say that football is more important than wrestling. It's school administrators that decide that. Interestingly, in some of the cases in which men's wrestling was cut, other men's sports were added at the same time. One of the reasons for cutting wrestling in some cases was lack of interest. Women's sports and Title IX are an easy scape-goat. Too easy. That might be true if Title IX were a quota law, which it evidently isn't, as proven by the fact that 30 years after it's passage, most schools aren't in compliance on the basis of proportionality. That is pretty good fear-mongering, though. Things haven't changed all that much since the 70's after all. That is an interesting statistic. But it can't be attributed to Title IX. There are already significantly more women graduating from college than men. I wonder if that isn't the bigger issue.
Cybersoccer News just posted another article, it has a picture of the NWT with Joy holding Madi, wondering if there will be a 4th generation of Title IX women http://www.cybersoccernews.com/wusa/030121titleIX.shtml
The Truth about Title IX There are actually two indepth articles on Title IX currently running on www.cybersoccernews.com. They have quite a few details on the issues and discuss how future decisions will impact women's sports in the USA. Ed
The question I have about Title IX is whe is it going to be applied to all of the other extra-carricular activities? There is nothing in the law that makes it exclusive to athletics. When you look at the number of women vs. men participating in other activities (music, drama, art, etc.), the numbers are hugely skewed in the women's favor. God help the university if some bureaucrat decides to take on the various departments within universities because they don't meet proportionality. Now surely some will argue that the field is leve because men can join. And that is true except for the fact that in sports if teams could stock themselves only with walk-ons, the numbers would be likewise lopsided (Otherwise, Title IX would not apply at all to the Ivy League or DIII). Everytime I hear either side make any arguments on this issue I see obfuscations and selective quoting of the facts. The Pro Title IX folks ignore the interest factor and the fact that Football and basketball, for the most part, pay for everyone else. The Anti's conviently forget that some belt tightening and economical use of resources on football could help out the money woes that have made so many cuts necessary.
This was the main article on page 3 of today's U-T sports section, and has a couple of paragraphs on what Julie Foudy had to say... http://www.signonsandiego.com/news/uniontrib/wed/sports/news_1s29title9.html
Misrepresentations? This is the first of what seems to be several rather overblown or possibly even hysterical statements made by the Title IX establishment. It seems to me that voters in the minority will be given space in the record to report their views. Certainly, they will command major space in any news coverage in this report. Their views are not being supressed. Sounds a little over the top to me. QUOTE]Originally posted by Tsunami "To suggest that it's OK for a federal law to allow women to be treated in a manner that is inferior to men is unfathomable in this day and age," she ( Donna Lopiano ) said. [/QUOTE] To suggest that anyone wanting to adjust perceived problems with Title IX is in favor of unequal treatment for women is unfair. Some of the people who disagree with the law as currently enforced are women. Lopiano's statement infers that they are dupes. QUOTE]Originally posted by Tsunami Lopiano said those measures would result in the loss of hundreds of thousands of high school participation opportunities for girls and the loss of up to $189 million annually in college athletic grants for women. [/QUOTE] This seems to be way over the top. I would be surprised it those numbers are equal to 5-7% of current gender proportionality. If, however, they are, then the use of them without explanation is disingenously aimed at the naive. I've been a supporter of womens' athletic opportunities and an admirer of Ms. Lopiano for many years. I'm hoping that her remarks have been taken out of a more responsible context, b/c I would be very disappointed if she follows the political trend of appealing to the lowest denominator. It seems that Julie Foudy makes the start of a sensible arguement in her comments, why not begin there? I'm very interested in the final report.
Dissent Report to be Included This article was on the front page of the sports section. I assume that Bush's PR people decided it would be the lesser of two evils to include the minority opinion in the report... http://www.signonsandiego.com/news/uniontrib/thu/sports/news_1s30title9.html
Re: Misrepresentations? There's a subtle point here. In addition to adding leeway, Yow's proposal anchors proportionality at 50-50. The current interpretation of Title IX anchors proportionality at the female enrollment (56% on average, and climbing). The drop from 56% to 43% could approach $200 million.
Re: Re: Misrepresentations? This would indicate that men should be given some help on admissions until they catch up with women. What would that cost?
Re: The Truth about Title IX Dear Ed, Thanks for the completely off the wall, partisan, fact-free hatchet job on the current administration. Will you be pulling the article now that the inane hysterics about "proposed Bush administration changes" (which NEVER EXISTED IN THE FIRST PLACE) have apparently amounted to a single proposal to not count walk-on athletes? And can you explain to me how this jibes with your banner headline proclaiming that the proposed changes would have a "debilitating effect" on US Soccer? Thanks, Bill (PS: two of the 14 voting members, Julie Foudy and Debbie Yow, said to say that contrary to your absurd, hysterical claims, this committee was not some kind of anti-female pogrom. Thanks)
Here's more I'm sorry that I couldn't finish my response to this post. I don't think that women are receiving 56% of funding now. How can they lose something they don't have? I've supported women's opportunities, Title IX, and the WSF for a long time. Their hysterical response to this committee has cost them ( WSF ) considerable respect with me.
Title IX vote today For those who would like the latest news, rather than trash retoric, here is a link from USA Today online from today. http://www.usatoday.com/sports/college/other/2003-01-30-titleix-vote_x.htm