Title IX fraud

[inthesuburbs]

A good example of a college sports reporter doing more than watching the games and gathering quotes:

http://www.nytimes.com/2011/04/26/sports/26titleix.html

At the University of South Florida, more than half of the 71 women on the cross-country roster failed to run a race in 2009. Asked about it, a few laughed and said they did not know they were on the team.

At Marshall University, the women’s tennis coach recently invited three freshmen onto the team even though he knew they were not good enough to practice against his scholarship athletes, let alone compete. They could come to practice whenever they liked, he told them, and would not have to travel with the team.

At Cornell, only when the 34 fencers on the women’s team take off their protective masks at practice does it become clear that 15 of them are men. Texas A&M and Duke are among the elite women’s basketball teams that also take advantage of a federal loophole that allows them to report male practice players as female participants.

 

[Cubbiebum]

 

[Armchair_QB]

Pretty good example of why using proportionality is a ridiculous way to quantify Title IX compliance.


Also, if the law allows you to count male practice athletes towards your numbers, it's not fraud.

 

[tapintoamerica]

I'm confused. I thought the NCAA had explicitly forbidden women's team from using men as practice players.

 

[Stitch]

NAIA schools do this all of the time. One school has 26 women on the volleyball team. You hardly ever see the NAIA school get investigated, though, because no one really cares.

 

[Turtle Wexler]

Pretty good example of why using proportionality is a ridiculous way to quantify Title IX compliance.

That's why there's two other prongs in the three-prong test of compliance.

The monkey wrench is football. Women's squads are forced to make up for the burden of an 85-full-scholarship-player football roster. It's cheaper for schools to pack the track roster than to add another women's sport.

 

[dkphxf]

I wish the NCAA would grow a pair and limit football scholarships to, say, 25. That would provide more balance to the sport -- all the guy would be backups at Alabama would go to, say, Kentucky and create more teams that are better, thereby creating more interest. This would also make the Division II product better.

 

[mediaguy]

DKPHXF ... Yes, just ask the NCAA to take away from what they're providing to their primary source of revenue. So many people think college athletes should be paid (I don't), and you're saying "Take funding away from the primary sport that funds all others." Kids will be as likely to go to other sports as other schools, and they won't make a college any money on a track scholarship. Your solution is to dilute the product, which costs cuts, among other things.

 

[TheHacker]

People would still show up to watch college football, regardless of how many scholarship athletes there are on the team. They went from 100 down to 85 and the game survived.

An NFL team has 53 plus eight on the practice squad. That's 61. Yes, I know college is a whole different thing. So what? How come an NFL team can play 16 games with 53 (or 61) guys and a college team needs 85 to play 12 games?

And to look at this a totally different way, maybe the NFL should man up and use some of its $9 billion to create its own minor league instead of relying on the NCAA. How come it's OK for baseball to run its own minor league system, but the NFL and NBA insist on relying on colleges. If anything perpetuates college sports as we know them, it's that.

 

[DanOregon]

I never understood why Title IX couldn't be carried over to other extra-curricular activities like the arts - I figure there are plenty of musicians and actresses who are more devoted to their craft than some of the people that fill out rosters in female sports.
I always thought the key word was "opportunity" not "roster spot."

 

[black dude with pompano]

One of the NYT's commenters suggests that perhaps some of the Title IX money could be spent on dance programs, or hiking or any other thing for which actual female students might have interest rather than stacking programs or creating bowling teams in order to foster 60/40 compliance.

 

[dkphxf]

DKPHXF ... Yes, just ask the NCAA to take away from what they're providing to their primary source of revenue. So many people think college athletes should be paid (I don't), and you're saying "Take funding away from the primary sport that funds all others." Kids will be as likely to go to other sports as other schools, and they won't make a college any money on a track scholarship. Your solution is to dilute the product, which costs cuts, among other things.

I'm pretty certain boosters at Alabama would still love the Crimson Tide and give lavishly. And perhaps boosters at Kentucky would be happy to provide money to the school with a better product on the field. Television rights won't change because people would still love watching games. And if they ever went to a playoff system (i.e. took control of their most profitable product), they could easily generate a heckuva a lot more money.

This then raises the central point. Schools pay hundreds of thousands for directional schools from Louisiana to play a game. They also pay coaches upwards of $4 million, hundreds of thousands on recruiting and millions on football stadium renovations, etc. If funding other sports through football were so important, why would Cal cut baseball one or two years after spending $320 million on football stadium renovations?

Why should one sport have enough money to field four different sets of offenses and defenses while baseball only gets 10-ish scholarships and basketball 11?

 

[dirtybird]

A good example of a college sports reporter doing more than watching the games and gathering quotes

Looking through her archives, it does not appear the author is a college sports reporter in the conventional sense. I see no game stories at all.

 

[Turtle Wexler]

DanOregon, BDWP: You can't compare what places like South Florida are doing to pad roster numbers with actual female interest in athletics. One is an administrative paper-shuffling move and the other is interest generated by students. In a college environment, how often are those the same things?

For example, let's say the university has a strong club rugby or soccer or rodeo program. The way to meet student interest and maintain compliance would be to elevate that club sport to varsity status. But that costs an athletic department money, so they don't do it. Much easier to pack the track roster than to prepare a rugby field, provide uniforms/trainers/paid coaches, give them a travel budget, etc.

But seeing a university pack the track roster and determining that all female student athletic interest has been met is a jump in logic. They don't add a bowling team because women are clamoring to bowl. They add it because they don't have to build a facility or buy much equipment because the team can use City Bowl down the road. And then they meet the "history of adding opportunities" prong and then the football program doesn't come under threat of investigation. Problem solved.

Also, Title IX does apply to art and music. It also applies to the science lab and the English department and the student government association. Title IX is about all educational opportunities, not just sports. Sports was just so out of whack for so long it was easy to put into focus. If a school decided the music department was only open to female students, that would be in violation. Or if they decided to only allow men into its medical school, that would be in violation.

But to imply that the enforcement of Title IX should apply more softly to athletics and include female participation numbers for art and music is to reinforce the stereotypes that girls and women don't like sports and fewer men than women like the arts. Simply not true.

 

[mediaguy]

What Dirtybird said.

 

[NightHawk112005]

Football doesn't need 85 scholarships at all. I'd say around 60 would be just fine.

 

[Armchair_QB]

I wish the NCAA would grow a pair and limit football scholarships to, say, 25. That would provide more balance to the sport -- all the guy would be backups at Alabama would go to, say, Kentucky and create more teams that are better, thereby creating more interest. This would also make the Division II product better.

Which totally disregards the truth that you're still limiting male scholarship opportunities while not helping women's athletics.

The issue isn't that there aren't enough scholarships for high-performing female athletes. The issue is that there aren't enough high-performing female athletes for the scholarships.

Why should the thousands of male athletes who are deserving of a college scholarship have their opportunities limited just to meet a quota that fails to take into account interest and ability? I'm certain that was not the intent of the legislation.

And regarding the three-prong comment from earlier, while there are three different prongs to prove compliance, history shows that courts take the easy way out and rely solely on proportionality.

 

[Armchair_QB]

People would still show up to watch college football, regardless of how many scholarship athletes there are on the team. They went from 100 down to 85 and the game survived.

An NFL team has 53 plus eight on the practice squad. That's 61. Yes, I know college is a whole different thing. So what? How come an NFL team can play 16 games with 53 (or 61) guys and a college team needs 85 to play 12 games?

And to look at this a totally different way, maybe the NFL should man up and use some of its $9 billion to create its own minor league instead of relying on the NCAA. How come it's OK for baseball to run its own minor league system, but the NFL and NBA insist on relying on colleges. If anything perpetuates college sports as we know them, it's that.

Actually, the NFL has an unlimited roster. If a guy gets hurt they can sign a free agent. If all three of the Bears' QBs get hurt they can sign three more.

If a college team loses all three of its QBs they can't call a guy up from a junior college in the middle of the season.

 

[dooley_womack1]

Except that football team has 7-8 quarterbacks. And I agree that 85 scholarship is an excessive total

 

[dkphxf]

I wish the NCAA would grow a pair and limit football scholarships to, say, 25. That would provide more balance to the sport -- all the guy would be backups at Alabama would go to, say, Kentucky and create more teams that are better, thereby creating more interest. This would also make the Division II product better.

Which totally disregards the truth that you're still limiting male scholarship opportunities while not helping women's athletics.

The issue isn't that there aren't enough scholarships for high-performing female athletes. The issue is that there aren't enough high-performing female athletes for the scholarships.

Why should the thousands of male athletes who are deserving of a college scholarship have their opportunities limited just to meet a quota that fails to take into account interest and ability? I'm certain that was not the intent of the legislation.

And regarding the three-prong comment from earlier, while there are three different prongs to prove compliance, history shows that courts take the easy way out and rely solely on proportionality.

A good example of a college sports reporter doing more than watching the games and gathering quotes:

http://www.nytimes.com/2011/04/26/sports/26titleix.html

At the University of South Florida, more than half of the 71 women on the cross-country roster failed to run a race in 2009. Asked about it, a few laughed and said they did not know they were on the team.

At Marshall University, the women’s tennis coach recently invited three freshmen onto the team even though he knew they were not good enough to practice against his scholarship athletes, let alone compete. They could come to practice whenever they liked, he told them, and would not have to travel with the team.

At Cornell, only when the 34 fencers on the women’s team take off their protective masks at practice does it become clear that 15 of them are men. Texas A&M and Duke are among the elite women’s basketball teams that also take advantage of a federal loophole that allows them to report male practice players as female participants.

Cutting those 60 scholarships would save athletic budgets some money, which would allow you to expand the number of women's (and men's sports, including wrestling, lacrosse -- growing in popularity) sports. Stop worshipping football and there's a ****ton of money coming free.