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Commentary: Beware the latest attempt to subvert Title IX
Stephanie Schleuder Published Friday, February 25, 2000
Title IX, the law enacted by Congress in 1972, has increased the athletic opportunities for hundreds of thousands of girls and women. Many groups have tried to undermine the spirit and intent of the law by spreading false and inaccurate information.
The latest attempt to subvert Title IX comes from coaches of some men's nonrevenue sports (wrestling, for example). They claim that guidelines used by the Office of Civil Rights to determine Title IX compliance are seriously limiting participation and destroying some men's nonrevenue collegiate sports.
Some historical data are necessary to understand the scope of the issue.
In 1970, only 1 of every 27 high school girls played varsity sports. Today, that figure is one of every 2.5 high school girls. Participation by high school females increased from 294,015 in 1971 to 2,472,043 in 1997. Women's college athletic participation has more than tripled in the same period.
Despite this steep increase in athletic participation for girls and women, there were also steep increases in the level of participation for boys and men. Today, male athletes still receive twice the participation opportunities afforded female athletes.
Title IX was never intended to disadvantage men's college sports -- it was enacted to give opportunities for participation to girls and women. It is the individual colleges that are choosing to disadvantage men's nonrevenue sports. Title IX does not tell colleges how to comply with the law -- it just addresses how to judge equity.
Donna A. Lopiano, executive director of the Women's Sports Foundation, explains the compliance choices schools have with this parable: A family has two sons. One is a football player, one a wrestler. Their parents buy expensive equipment for them, send them to sports camps, and do everything to support their interests. Then a daughter is born. When she's old enough, she goes to her parents and says, "I want to play." Because the family has devoted all of its money to the athletics interests of its first two children, however, the parents face a difficult decision.
"The parents have three options," Lopiano told a group of female athletes at a recent conference. "The first is that they can kill their last-born. The second is that they can kill the wrestler. Or you can get all of the kids around the table and say, 'We're going to have to work this out.' Maybe the football player and the wrestler get a smaller piece of the pie -- but they still get to play."
This type of reasonable response to equity issues is not happening in college sports. College presidents and athletic administrators are refusing to reallocate the budgets of men's sports -- primarily revenue-producing sports, like football -- to accommodate men and women on teams that don't make money for their departments. "It's the absence of educational leadership," Lopiano says. "Presidents and athletics directors are choosing to kill their children."
Many of the losses in men's sports came during the 1980s, before Title IX was ever being enforced. In 1984, the U.S. Supreme Court ruled that Title IX applied only to programs receiving federal funds directly. Very few athletics departments receive money from the federal government, so Title IX had virtually no effect on athletics departments between 1984 and 1988. In 1988, however, Congress passed the Civil Rights Restoration Act, which specified that Title IX applied to all aspects of an educational institution's programs, including athletics, if any part of the institution received federal funds.
Individuals currently wishing to dismantle Title IX claim that it has been almost singularly responsible for schools cutting men's collegiate wrestling teams. But, according to National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA) statistics, 85 of the 117 wrestling teams that have been dropped since 1981 were disbanded between 1981 and 1988 -- before Title IX was being enforced. Only 32 were dropped between 1989 and 1998, the latest year for which figures are available.
Opponents of Title IX also claim that football should be exempt from Title IX because it is responsible for supporting all other sports programs at schools. This is a myth. Among NCAA football programs in all competitive divisions, 81 percent spend more than they bring in and contribute nothing to other sport budgets. Even among Division IA football programs (the largest schools), more than a third are running deficits in excess of $1 million per year. In fact, special consideration already is given to football under the Javits Amendment. This amendment allows for increased expenditures because of the nature of the sport -- i.e., more expensive protective equipment. Affording further special consideration to football would permit an economic justification for discrimination. This would allow an institution to say, in essence, "We're sorry we can't afford to give your daughter the same opportunity to play sports as your son because football needs more money."
I urge individuals to look carefully at this issue rather than respond to the false and misleading rhetoric of groups looking to dismantle Title IX.
-- Stephanie Schleuder, former volleyball coach at the University of Minnesota, is head volleyball coach at Macalester College.
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Three area wrestlers win state titles
The Houston Chronicle
February 27, 2000
As the final seconds of the biggest and final match of his high
school career ticked down, a smile began to emerge on the face of Katy's
Seth Bregman.
He had his opponent, Parker Chaddick of Highland Park, pinned to the mat
with no chance of making some sort of a move that would cut into his 7-3
lead.
"I feel incredible right now," said Bregman, the 160-pound champion who was
brought to tears when the time on the clock finally did expire. "This was my
last
wrestling match ever and this is the way I wanted to go out. I didn't expect
it, but I guess now I can say that I really do know how to wrestle."
The Katy senior was one of three Houston-area wrestlers to claim UIL state
titles Saturday night at the Austin Convention Center. Also winning were two
wrestlers
in the girls division - Heather Morris of Klein Oak (110 pounds) and Krista
Hartman of Katy (138 pounds).
Hartman won by pinning Rachel Rodriquez of Hereford in the final, and she
did it on no sleep.
"I didn't even have the chance of dreaming about this because I couldn't get
any sleep the night before," Hartman said. "But I guess I got to live my
dream anyway."
She wasn't the only one.
Klein Oak's Morris came up with a pin on Sam Houston's Cathy Cotter in the
110-pound class to win her second consecutive title.
"I knew I was in for a dog fight there at the end," said Morris, who had to
put an ice pack on an injured elbow at the end of her match.
Hartman and Morris ended the season with unblemished marks of 18-0 and 24-0,
respectively.
San Antonio Express-News
February 27, 2000, Sunday
Amarillo Caprock was the winner of the girls team title with 901/2
points. Arlington Sam Houston was runner-up with 88. MacArthur
finished 16th with 151/2 points.
Mac's Tai Ingram, who was competing in her first state tournament,
finished third in the 148 class with a pin of Austin McCallum's
Melissa Rutledge 30 seconds into the third period.
"She's (Rutledge) one of the best I've ever wrestled against," said
Ingram, a senior. "I'm not sure how I did it, but I did it, and I
feel great."
MacArthur sophomore Jennifer Starnes, the Region IV champion at 128
pounds, was leading her first-round match on points but became
embroiled in an officiating controversy that occurred early in the
second period.
"I hadn't gone against any of these girls before, so I didn't know
how to wrestle against any of their strategies," said Starnes after
getting pinned by Katherine Quinonez of El Paso Hanks 1:49 into the
second period.
"I had a couple of reversals and back points on her (Quinonez) that
they (the referees) didn't give me. He (MacArthur coach Jerry
McHugh) tried to protest, but they didn't give me the
points."
Austin American-Statesman
February 27, 2000, Sunday
Action on the girls side was much closer, as Amarillo Caprock eked out a
90.5-88 win over Arlington Sam Houston. Killeen Ellison finished seventh,
paced by the
second-place finish of Angela Whitley in the 181-pound class behind champion
Erica Coburn of Wall, who pinned Whitley in the final. Lanier finished 10th
thanks to
the third-place finishes of 102-pounder Tabithia Ramsey and 165-pounder
Jamie Bottomley.
"Each of those two came a match away from the finals," Lanier Coach Craig
Grace said. "The competition here is improving."
The first girls champion to be crowned at the tournament was 95-pound
Khouanchay "Crunchy" Inthirath of Amarillo Palo Duro, who pinned Vicky
Morales of El
Paso Hanks in the second period.
"I feel like I've been immortalized," Inthirath enthused after the win.
"Everyone, even my family, thought I would break my bones. It's exciting,
exhilarating. But I'm
happy it's over with. If it had gone one more round I don't know what would
have happened."
"Every match last year was a pin," said Sam Houston assistant coach Sam
Snyder. "This year there were some matches that went down to the end."
That was not the case, though, for those involving Tori Adams of Amarillo
Caprock, who finished the season 26-0 after one lopsided decision and a
couple of pins
in the 148-pound class. Adams, who was voted the outstanding girls wrestler,
claimed her fourth straight state title. She picked up her first two before
the UIL took
over staging the tournament.
"I started wrestling when I was 8," Adams said. Her career won't end in
Austin.
"I'm taking some visits to colleges," Adams said. "Then, 2004 will be the
first year in which it (women's wrestling) will be in the Olympics."
