There are times where the stars align and issues that span more than just the world of sports collide. The impending hearings to confirm John Roberts as the country's next Supreme Court Justice will most certainly focus on his opposition to Title IX.
Also, this past week, Wisconsin Badgers Head Football Coach Barry Alvarez announced that the 2005 season would be his last. Alvarez will still continue to act as Athletic Director for the university.
You may ask, what do these two events have in common?
On the surface, absolutely nothing, but behind the scenes Alvarez faces a problem that is desperate need of a solution. Next spring will mark the 15-year anniversary of the last Badgers baseball team. A program that needed to be cut in order for the athletic department to move closer to compliance with Title IX.
Before everyone sends in the "you are sexist" e-mails, please hear me out.
Title IX was born June 23, 1972. In its 33 years of existence it has not only promoted women's sports -- it created them. In 1972 most of the opportunities that females have today did not even exist. At the inception of Title IX the ratio of women that were interested in competing in college athletics was one in 25. Now it's one in three.
The end result of Title IX has produced the WNBA, the Women's World Cup and the recently created and highly successful Women's World Cup of Softball. None of this would have existed if Title IX didn't force universities around to the country to comply with its proportionality component. This component has worked and it has made the world a better place.
While you could go on and on about the success stories spawned from Title IX there is also the fallout aspect of what has become a silent assassin. In order to better understand the ramification of this rule one must better understand its components. Title IX's goal is for gender equity in intercollegiate athletics and is based on a three-pronged test.
Proportionality: Are intercollegiate participation opportunities for male and female students substantially proportionate to undergraduate enrollment? If participation is proportionate, then the school is considered within compliance.
Historical effort: Where it is determined by the proportionality test that one gender is under-represented, has the institution shown a history and continuing practice of adding sports programs for those in the under-represented class? Compliance in this area satisfies the requirements of Title IX.
Effective accommodation: If there is not compliance under the first two tests, a school can be in compliance if it has provided varsity status to any sport played by the under-represented class on an intramural or club level that has shown strong interest and ability to compete on the inter-collegiate varsity level.
When the Chicago branch of the Office of Civil Rights began investigating the University of Wisconsin in the 1989 for not complying with Title IX then Athletic Director Pat Richter was forced to cut men's programs as well as add women's program in order to come in compliance with the rule.
Thus, the Big Ten has been playing with a 10-team league because Wisconsin dropped its baseball team.
Basically, in layman's terms, the proportionality aspect of Title IX is if 50 percent of the enrollment is female, 50 percent of the athletes must be female. At UW, 51 percent of the enrollment is female, thus at least half of the athletic opportunities have to be for females. This is why of the 24 athletic programs at UW 13 of them are female sports.
There is an obvious reason why there are more women's teams than men's teams, but it is also the reason why there is the funding for women's sports in the first place.
Wisconsin is a big-time Division 1 football school. As much as football program is run by the athletic department, the athletic department is run by the football program. Football makes $5-10 million per year, and the majority of that money is used to finance many of the other men's sports that do not make a profit as well as all 13 women's sports that operate with a deficit.
Those numbers can only increase as the revenue from the newly created luxury boxes in Camp Randall starts to come in. The current health of UW's athletic department can be attributed to one man and that is Alvarez. The football program in 1991 under Don Morton was a money sucker not a moneymaker. Now it is the department's bell cow.
Where football kills the athletic department is that it is by far them largest sport in terms of athletes. There is no female comparison to the 100 plus athletes that play football. You need five women's soccer teams or five women's softball teams to make the difference that the football team creates.
Therefore, while the football program is the lifeblood of the department, it also is the death bell for other men's sports. UW is one of the few schools in the Big Ten that offers both men's hockey and men's soccer. With Title IX requiring proportionality it handcuffs the department from having any other men's team without adding women's teams.
This is regardless if there is even a need for other women's sports or if the funding is available to take on another sport that has absolutely no chance of turning a profit. This is the main crux of the problem. UW has the funding for a men's baseball team and there is no question that there is a need for it. Being the only team in the Big Ten without a baseball team is embarrassing.
But in order for the athletic department to have a baseball team they need to add more women's teams or cut one of the other men's team. The latter is what most schools have been doing. In order to be in compliance with Title IX sports like wrestling and men's volleyball have gone by the wayside -- especially at schools where they have hockey and soccer.
In no way could any intelligent person say that women benefit from cutting men's sports when the athletic department has the funding to properly run each program.
Another way to solve the problem is to simply add more women's sports. Ohio State has gone this route by adding sports like women's pistol firing, riflery and synchronized swimming. They boast the largest athletic department in the Big Ten with 36 teams (17 men's and 19 women's), but the extra funding has to come form somewhere. Luckily the Buckeyes have both football and basketball to fall back on, just like the Badgers.
Where do the solutions lie?
Legislation
At the highest level, having a Supreme Court Justice that does not see eye-to-eye with the statute could encourage a new look into the state of gender equity. There is no longer a need to for Billy Jean King to defeat Bobby Riggs. The rule has done its job. It has made universities properly divide its funding by gender. It has given women the opportunity to grow, but now it has to be re-worked.
The basis of the statute clearly does not need to be changed, but the limitations on men's sports do. Proportionality is a good place to start, but the fact is simple that there are more men that are interested in playing sports than women. As long as the funding for additional men's sports does not affect the funding for the women's sports where is the harm? (vice versa as well)
Take women's hockey for example -- it is a fairly new sport and Wisconsin is one of the few universities to field a team. In no way should they have to add an additional men's team or have to steal funding from another women's sports to begin a new sport.
Tweak the System
Another idea is to eliminate football from the equation. It is an animal unlike any other and it skews what the original idea of Title IX was in the first place.
While it is a logical solution and it solves the problem the idea of not counting 100 male scholarships doesn't exactly mold with the idea of gender equity. Also I can't see the Martha Burke's of the world agreeing with another exception for football. In many people's eyes football is the problem not the solution.
Simply Expand
At the local level, Alvarez needs to go the way of Ohio State. If it takes having a women's pistol-firing team to have a baseball team then that is what it takes. Again it all comes down to money. Can the athletic department afford two more sports in that will operate in the red?
Either way you look at this issue there needs to be some change to solve a basic problem. Looking back on how successful Title IX was and is a model of how society develops and matures. Title IX needs to have mandatory minimums, but it need not have limitations. It was created to improve opportunities for women, not to limit opportunities for men in 33 years later.
In 1972 Title IX was implemented to level the playing field. It has done that by making universities provide opportunities for women athletes. Unquestionably it has been a success. The desperate need is no longer there. The time has come for the same use of foresight that was used 33 years ago in order for gender equity to continue to evolve and improve in the future.
