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Compliance. It’s the buzzword for a university that meets the national gender equity standards set forth by Title IX. Title IX requires institutions to provide equal opportunities for men and women in education, which spills over into college athletics.
“It can be used a lot in athletics because at least 25 years ago, the differences were pretty startling between the way men and women were treated,” said Evelyn Silver, the University of Maine’s director of equal opportunities.
Even though the law is more than 25 years old, its effects linger today and are evident at the University of Maine.
The rise of women’s athletics coupled with the constant pressure of Title IX have opened doors for more women to have opportunities to participate in college athletics.
The Maine women’s volleyball and ice hockey teams exist as a result of coming into compliance with Title IX. The university isn’t the only player in bringing the level of women’s opportunities even with the men.
“You see a huge commitment towards gender equity not only from our institution but from the private donors as well,” Terry Kix, head field hockey coach said.
The ramifications of Title IX are felt daily throughout UMaine women’s athletics. Women’s athletic teams used to travel in vans, share office spaces with assistant coaches and just didn’t have equal facilities, when compared to men’s teams.
“When I first came here, we didn’t have a locker room,” Kix said. Maine has built a new softball field, which used to be nothing more than some gravel and a backstop. The new field, made possible from contributions outside the university, is another step in the direction of offering equitable facilities for men and women at UMaine.
“I’m not sure we would have ever gotten that if it wasn’t for Title IX and the pressure,” Silver said.
While Maine has made strides in providing equal opportunities for women, the school was not in full compliance as recent as 1998.
The Agreement
In June of 1998, the National Women’s Law Center picked 25 schools that weren’t up to par in areas concerning gender equity. These universities, including Maine were sued for not providing the proper opportunities for women. In response to the suit, Maine signed a settlement agreement saying that it would adhere to the standards.
“All of those 25 schools had to have a formal agreement,” Maine Athletic Director Suzanne Tyler said. “That formal agreement says that we will grow in proportion to our general student population.”
While Maine wasn’t one of the worst schools, it was not in compliance with the standards set forth by Title IX.
“A lot of people said `oh my god, you were among the worst 25 in the country.’ That is not the way they picked the schools,” Silver said. “They wanted a representative sample form all areas of the country, but they did feel we were out of compliance.”
The lawsuit targeted Maine for not giving women equal amounts of scholarship money, but once the investigation proceeded, it was determined that Maine didn’t provide an equal number of opportunities for women to play sports, according to Silver.
As a result, women’s hockey and volleyball are now available and Maine is in compliance with Title IX in terms of athletic opportunities.
Compliance is determined in relation to the number of full-time undergraduate students on campus. In 1999-2000, 47.5 percent of the student body were women, according to an annual disclosure of information filed by the university.
“Our goal then is that about 48 percent of the roster slots, participation opportunities should go to women,” Silver said.
Women get 45.6 percent of the total opportunites to play a sport at Maine. Out of 561 student-athletes, 256 are women.
“They’re willing to give you a point or two,” Silver said. “We’re within two percentage points … that’s close enough.”
The implementation of Title IX’s parameters has taken a toll on men’s sports around the country. As schools were being forced to comply with Title IX, many didn’t have the money necessary to increase funding for women, so the money had to come from somewhere.
“The backlash is that Title IX as presented was never intended to hurt male programs,” Maine Athletic Director Suzanne Tyler said.
At Maine, the golf team is being dropped. According to Silver, Title IX is partly to blame for this change.
“It’s a combination for golf,” she said. “I do think some of it had to do with Title IX, but there’s was also a question about competition and resources.”
Silver also points out that the national trend of cutting sports isn’t all due to Title IX. She said that unless you’re a top-notch Division I school, college sports are expensive.
“When you read around the country what’s going on now, there are a lot of sports being cut,” Silver said. “Not all of them are for gender equity.”
Improvements
Maine has recently increased scholarship dollars so that the women’s scholarships are in line with the money given to men.
“We’ve come a long way in the last four or five years,” Kix said. “We were really not at a good place with that.”
Currently, Maine gives 42.3 percent of all scholarship money to women athletes, less than the 47 percent of women enrolled, but not the discrepancy that once existed.
“The big thing is that with the additional scholarships, we’re at a higher percentage to meet the parameters of what title nine really means,” Kix said.
In addition to scholarship dollars, Kix lists locker rooms, travel accommodations and office space as all areas
Areas to Improve
In adding women’s scholarship dollars, the athletic department is closer to complying with Title IX, but giving away that money means finding quality student athletes through recruiting. And according to Kix, recruiting dollars is an area that could be improved in terms of gender equity.
“That to me is a big issue because we are trying to say to the coaches of the women’s teams, `we have more scholarship money for you to give out,’” Silver said. “We’ve given them a lot of scholarship dollars but they’ve got to be able to get out there and get on the road.”
In recruiting, the athletic department allocates 37 percent of the dollars to women’s sports, 10 percentage points less than the school’s enrollment percentage and about $60,000 less than men’s programs receive.
Coaches salaries are also in the same boat as recruiting. Kix pointed out that Maine has made the most improvements in areas that affect the student athletes but that coaches salaries is an area that could use improvement.
“I think there’s probably a huge difference in salaries from the men compared to the women per program,” she said.
The pay scale discrepancy is nearly $20,000 per position. On average, the athletic department pays coaches of men’s teams $54,283 per position. Coaches for women’s teams make $35,806 per position. Silver pointed out that pay scales are often subjective, based on a particular coach’s experience, program recognition, media attention and other factors.
While Maine made strides by coming into compliance by adding two women’s sports, those new sports have stretched support resources such as strength and conditioning training room staff.
“We elevated the number of programs for student athletes, but we didn’t add any additional positions that support those programs, so it stretches everything,” Kix said. “I’d say that’s been probably the most difficult part of trying to come into compliance with gender equity from the department’s point of view.”
Title IX has drawn criticism for the unintended consequences that come from allotting equal funds to both men’s and women’s sports and the way it has been implemented at schools across the country.
“I just think that the whole gender equity and Title IX subject is really touchy because the most important message we want out there is that we don’t want the men’s sports to suffer … but we do need to elevate the opportunities for women,” Kix said.
Some information used in this article is from the October 2000 EADA report.
