Title IX solutions?

I can not really think of a solution, and believe me, being here at Maryland, we have tried, but check out the Baltimore Sun from November 19th. There was a great article about it.

"Title IX is fair game for debate"

COLLLEGE PARK - Did college athletics replace one

caste system with another? University of Maryland

athletic director Debbie Yow thinks so - in the last

generation, programs have gone from an all-male

orientation to one in which some men's teams are...

Why don't you start with this angle:

"Football is the elephant in the middle of the road that no one wants to talk about," Lopiano said. "Everyone in the business knows that you don't need 100 scholarships for football, and that you don't even need 85. What hurts is not Title IX, it's that schools don't have the money to do everything they want. There's nothing wrong with having a multi-tiered athletic program. An institution can't be the best at everything.

No, it's that Football is a co-ed sport and a number of women have played on college teams, yet all of the scholarships count against the "men's" total, so the women end up getting 80 more scholarships than the men in every other sport.

Yes of course.

The solution would be to deduct the 3 scholarships taken up by women football players (nationally) in this "co-ed" sport and start from there. Such a well thought out response third choice.

third choice wrote:

No, it's that Football is a co-ed sport and a number of women have played on college teams, yet all of the scholarships count against the "men's" total, so the women end up getting 80 more scholarships than the men in every other sport.

Better yet. Force the football programs to use 50% of their scholarship money or roster reserved for female athletes on these "co-ed" teams. There, now it would be a "co-ed" sport!

Men and women compete in the classroom together. Title nine was passed to make sure that discimination does not take place. Single sex P.E. classes no longer exist because of title nine. The Supreme court has ruled that separate but equal is not equal, (in a case about race).

The simple solution is to eliminate mens and womens teams and have only co-ed teams. These teams should be filled on a merit basis. Let men and women compete in sports the same as they do in the classroom.

You wanted a solution I just gave you one. It would make for a very provocative paper. It also would send people like 16x into a hissy fit. :-)

Really? Well your wrong. I am all for it. Every roster should be 50-50 men and women. I think it might work and help to return sports to their original intention.

separate but equal is unequal wrote:

You wanted a solution I just gave you one. It would make for a very provocative paper. It also would send people like 16x into a hissy fit. :-)

nothing compares to the hissy-fits you minor sports dudes have every time the topic comes up.

The reason why Title IX has so much clout to it is because it is misinterpreted. What happens is that when football gets 85 scholarships, all the women's programs at a particular school get to use those to spread out evenly, while the men's programs flounder with hardly any. This is the true answer: football should be taken out of the equation because 1.) few, if any women play the sport and 2.) at most schools it brings in most of their revenue. So after football is taken out of the picture, each sport should be treated equally giving men and women the same amount of scholarships WITHIN the given sport, not just adding up all the scholarships to make sure men and women have the same amount.

I believe that revenue-generating sports should not be included in the m/f count if the revenues pay for other sports. That takes football out of the equation, and encourages funding of other sports. I think it could do more to promote equality than the current system because a school that has good football/mens bb teams will then want to devote money to other sports so that they can keep up the football/bb scholarships.

There is a simple fix. Eliminate football from the equation.

Football is the only all-male sport (yeah, I know once in a while a women trys out as a punter). Practically all other sports are played by both men and women. Eliminate football, then give the same number of scholarships to both men and women in all other sports.

Legally, I don't think eliminating football from consideration is likely to fly anytime soon. I would have to be reclassified as 'entertainment' like the WWF so it didn't count as a sport. Not likely.

But I see two separate issues in Title IX. The first is the scholarship issue. I, and probably many others on this board, would be happy to see the number of football scholarships cut sharply to allow for other sports to increase scholarship participation. But the second issue is overall numbers, and this is where I think Title IX is inappropriately interpreted at present. Coaches are forced to turn away walk-ons because they count too. That doesn't make sense, because the purpose of Title IX was to ensure equal opportunity. The reasonable way to approach this while encouraging Americans to be active and not sit in front of the TV (or computer) all day is to make all teams open to walk-on participation. That way everybody has the opportunity to participate in college athletics, independent of the scholarship question. Then, if more men or women are participating, it isn't because of funding differences (scholarship numbers were the same for both men and women) but because of their choices. But they all had the opportunity.

My two cents.

Zat0pek wrote:

There is a simple fix. Eliminate football from the equation.

Football is the only all-male sport (yeah, I know once in a while a women trys out as a punter). Practically all other sports are played by both men and women. Eliminate football, then give the same number of scholarships to both men and women in all other sports.

That's a good start, but not going far enough. The University of Vermont eliminated it's men's XC and track teams, but they don't have football. Hockey is a factor, I'm sure.

Here is a journalistic report from CNN.

You can read all about your so called "money-making" sport of football.

http://money.cnn.com/2001/11/13/news/column_sportsbiz/

If a large percentage of football teams are each losing an average of $1 million a year , then why should football be eliminated from the equation.

Your revenue producing theory doesn't work here, the taxpayers and college students are footing the bill.

Captain Haddock wrote:That's a good start, but not going far enough. The University of Vermont eliminated it's men's XC and track teams, but they don't have football. Hockey is a factor, I'm sure.

Jeez, I didn't mean eliminate football programs. I meant eliminate counting football scholarships in the calculation.

And no, this will not fly legally, although I could posit a scenario that would theoretically pass muster to support it.

Title IX pales in comparison to the U.S. Supreme Courts decision today to review the University of Michigan Law School's "race conscious" admissions policy. It'll be struck down and all hell will break loose in the media. You heard it here first.

16x wrote:

Here is a journalistic report from CNN.

You can read all about your so called "money-making" sport of football.

http://money.cnn.com/2001/11/13/news/column_sportsbiz/

If a large percentage of football teams are each losing an average of $1 million a year , then why should football be eliminated from the equation.

Your revenue producing theory doesn't work here, the taxpayers and college students are footing the bill.

It gets tiring that every feminist out there tries to bring this up when it's pure statistical b.s. As Mark Twain said, "There are lies, damn lies, and statistics." What they mean is that the vast majority of D1 football teams lose a lot of money on the pure breakdown of money off of attendance/tv vs. money spent on scholarships, equipment, travel, etc. However, what they don't include is the huge amount of donations alumni send in to, or because of, the football team. Also, a lot of schools force the company that sponsors the football team to also sponsor the other teams. Many track teams can thank the football team for their free shoes. Also, football gives many schools a great name and great publicity and encourages more people to come to the school. You don't think that if the University of Nebraska cut its football team that undergraduate applications wouldn't drop by 30% in the first year?

The absolute final proof is seen in the answer to the simple question of why so many schools would spend so much money recruiting football players and lavishing them with fancy equipment if they couldn't make money off of it??? Obviously it's extremely profitable.

16x wrote:

Really? Well your wrong. I am all for it. Every roster should be 50-50 men and women. I think it might work and help to return sports to their original intention.

Apparently you did not read what I wrote. I said that team membership should be based on Merit. As good/great of a runner a Flanagan is she is not good enough to make a team at her school based on merit. So If you base it on merit women will be excluded because they are not as athletic as men.

I personally disagree with this argument but I do think just as strong of a case can be made for it as can be made for the proportionallity crap that is currently being used.

Title nine was meant to create not to distroy. If it is destroying then it is being interpreted wrong.

third choice wrote:

However, what they don't include is the huge amount of donations alumni send in to, or because of, the football team. Also, a lot of schools force the company that sponsors the football team to also sponsor the other teams. Many track teams can thank the football team for their free shoes. Also, football gives many schools a great name and great publicity and encourages more people to come to the school. You don't think that if the University of Nebraska cut its football team that undergraduate applications wouldn't drop by 30% in the first year?

The absolute final proof is seen in the answer to the simple question of why so many schools would spend so much money recruiting football players and lavishing them with fancy equipment if they couldn't make money off of it??? Obviously it's extremely profitable.

What is so tiresome is listening to people like you with the so called "I think it might be true proof". You can't quantify one thing you've listed, so you go after the actual statistics that someone has gathered.

Here's one I don't have the actual stats for, but I would GUESS that a very large percentage of Athletic Directors at D1 schools played sports, and I was guess the one constant is that they are male and played...you guessed it...football.

Every AD has HOPES of making $$$ from the sport of football, so that it can fund the rest of the sports. The reality now is that the Notre Dame schools are getting farther removed from the Ball State programs of the world in terms of generating cash. Just ask the BGSU Athletic Director who admits football ran up close to a million dollar deficit last year alone.

Since you are so misinformed....alumni donations that come in because of "sports" are typically spent in that same arena - "sports". They aren't discributed to support the business and art programs at the college. If someone makes a football donation, it is the football team that will spend and reap the benefits of the donation - like weight rooms that no other teams can use.

How about this: Equal opportunity for equal interest.