A Track Team Eliminated

This morning it was announced that the University of Delaware will eliminate its men's track and cross country teams, effective at the end of this school year.  The teams will technically still compete at the club level, but for all practical purposes the teams will no longer exist.  The headlines cited Title IX compliance, but the University's release said it was also partly a financial problem.

My immediate reaction was a rather snarky one, replying via Twitter that I was certain it was a football expenditure problem, not a Title IX problem.  I got a little bit of blowback for that.  I'll have to admit that the words "I don't have an opinion on this topic" will never cross my lips, regardless of what's being discussed.  Sometimes my opinions anger people, although (obviously) I think those people are just wrong.  Sometimes my opinions require further explanation, such as in this case.

I have more experience in these kinds of matters than most people.  My alma mater, Bowling Green, eliminated men's track and field in 2001.  Like Delaware, they said it was both Title IX and finances.  It took a little while, but I eventually learned that almost every statement released by BGSU was a lie.  What I've been able to find out about similar cuts from other universities shows the same basic pattern.

My experience is that athletic cuts almost never really are about Title IX compliance.  Rather, it's a problem of overspending which, for one reason or another, cannot continue.  The overspending is sometimes a chronic problem of the athletic department as a whole which has reached a limit due to its declining financial health.  Quite often, though, it's either because of a huge unanticipated short-term cost, or because of future grand plans which must be financed from somewhere.  And there's only one sport that both costs this much and has this kind of pull: football.

What most people don't realize is that football loses money.  Big money.  Some programs do make money, maybe about half of the 120 FBS teams (and only if you're using the most generous accounting system possible).  But the vast majority of the 126 FCS teams lose money, even the very good ones.  And, contrary to popular belief, a winning football team is often more expensive than a losing one.  Except for the BCS games, teams participating in bowl games lose money on the deal.  And this is not exclusive to the FBS level; Montana's AD reported losing $150,000 per year as a result of qualifying to two consecutive FCS Championship games.

Since ADs don't want to talk about losing money, Title IX is often used as a smokescreen in athletic cuts.  The 1972 law is often described as being about sports, but the original statute made no mention of it.  It merely said that educational programs receiving federal funds cannot discriminate on the basis of sex.  It's fashionable these days among conservatives or even some centrists to say that the law has gone too far.  But it's important to note how much different things were on college campuses before 1972.

Until Title IX was passed, colleges could and did have quotas limiting the number of female admissions.  Some universities refused to admit them at all, as did many individual colleges and/or programs at coed institutions.  This was done openly and without reservation.  A woman getting hired to work at a university, particularly in more prestigious jobs, was even more difficult than getting admitted (and the law's origins lie in that particular problem). 

Imagine this: mothers and daughters taxed, in part to support universities, at the same rate as their husbands and sons, but unable to attend or be hired.  Disregarding any issues of equal protection under the law, Title IX can be justified on a financial basis alone.  I'll be god-damned if my wife is going to pay the same tax rate as her male peers yet be denied the same access to employment and pay.  And all but the most crazed ideologues would similarly be adamant that their hardworking daughter not be denied a spot in a classroom in favor of a lower-achieving male.

Title IX is only a sticking point in sports because it's literally the only place in our educational institutions where we attempt a separate-but-equal system.  And just exactly what that means is difficult, because the original law is only one sentence long.  So the devil is in the details--the regulations made from the law that decide what it means to comply.  Commonly cited is a requirement that men and women participate in roughly equal ratio as their enrollment in the university in question.  It's sort of a requirement, not a hard and fast one, but it's far from the only issue.  Let's just say the situation can be rather complex, and not as simple as often made out to be.

Getting back to the situation at hand, Bowling Green did not have a Title IX problem in 2001, at least according to an article published in the Chronicle of Higher Education in June of 2001.  It was listed as one of 25 institutions that was doing things well in terms of gender equity.  What Bowling Green did have was an expensive football coaches' contract to buy out after he'd been fired, new Division 1-A membership requirements to meet, and plans for new facilities.  In the ten years since BGSU claimed it could not afford track's $200,000 or so per year, the university has spent $46 million on new facilities and upgrades to existing ones. You can find similar stories at Ohio U, Toledo, Fresno State, Ball State, Western Michigan, and just about everywhere else you want to look.

What about Delaware?  Do they really have a Title IX problem?  If we take the AD's word at face value, and some sacrifice must be made, the pain certainly is not being shared equally.  Of UD's 600 or so student-athletes, 105 are on the football roster.  This in the FCS subdivision, where only 63 scholarships are allowed among no more than 85 players, meaning that at least 20 of these players are non-scholarship walk-ons.  The very existence of those 20 walk-ons, most of whom rarely if ever get to play, are causing track and cross country to take the fall.  Whether this is right or wrong is not the issue; the issue is that the Athletic Director is not being fully truthful when he says that some sports have to be cut.  The truth is that he'd rather cut two entire men's sports (and the NCAA Sports Sponsorship and Grant-In-Aid funds that comes with them) than ask the football program to make even a minimum of sacrifice.

Remember what Montana's AD said about the FCS playoffs, and that they lost a significant amount of money by making repeated deep runs in the playoffs?  Delaware made it to the FCS championship game last fall.  You decide if this is a coincidence or not.

When these kinds of cuts are announced, ADs are right in one way when they cite Title IX.  The women's team would be going away if not for Title IX.  And I don't think the women would be eliminated instead of the men, but in addition to the men.

Obama & Track

Have you heard? There was an election the other day.

Sportswriters are already considering how an Obama presidency might affect their world; Phil Hersh and Lester Munson give the deepest thoughts on the issue. Two points have direct impact on track & field.

First and most obvious is a big boost to Chicago's bid for the 2009 Olympics. As an ardent supporter of his adopted hometown, Obama was involved in the bid long before anyone thought he had a reasonable chance of winning the Presidency. He will almost certainly make the final presentation in Copenhagen next year, and his plans for a national infrastructure rebuilding project won't disappoint the IOC either. Here, he's an obvious plus.

The second point would give me pause if I hadn't studied Obama's style so closely. Munson:

Coaches, athletes and administrators in a number of so-called minor sports, such as wrestling, have long been wary that their sports will be eliminated to meet the equality of gender requirements of Title IX, and they cannot be happy about Obama's election.

With President Bush in the White House and Dennis Hastert, a former wrestling coach, serving as Speaker of the U.S. House of Representatives, participants in those sports had some hope that Title IX requirements might be diluted.

Bush and his staff looked hard at Title IX and the possibility of enacting changes in the regulations of the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services that govern Title IX, but they backed away as opposition to any changes grew.

Obama, the father of two daughters, might not be sympathetic to those hoping to lessen the impact of Title IX.

Track coaches and fans could fit into this worried group, but I don't. Obama is not an idealogue, nor does he wish to govern divisively in an "I win, you lose" type of way. So to him, the whole "lessen the impact of Title IX" idea is a classic strawman argument. (Also, Munson might not know what he's talking about; Title IX is enforced by the Department of Education, not HHS, and it's been that way since they split off the DOE from HEW back in 1979.)

The big problem with current Title IX regulations is that institutions are allowed to show gender equity first and foremost by having equal numbers of male and female athletes, which in turn makes liabilities out of large but inexpensive men's sports such as track & field. This number-based approach is predicated on the wrong-headed assumption that all athletes place equal demands on the athletic department; an unrecruited walk-on (such as yours truly was) simply does not have much if any impact on the coach's time or the team's expenditures. This same numbers approach makes equal treatment of women's needs as athletes secondary to merely having them present in sufficient quantities. There has got to be a smarter way, one that benefits both men and women, and for the first time in decades I trust the chief executive to look for those kinds of solutions.

Title IX Smokescreen Still Working

Over at the "Bringing Back Ohio Track" blog, an article from the school paper about the "evils" of Title IX was posted. Read my comment about how the smokescreen still works. But's that what you might expect from a writer who uses the Eagle Forum as a source of unbiased information.

As for "feminist busybodies", they must not have any pull in this town. A local woman was beat nearly to unconsciousness by her ex-boyfriend, and later tied her up and held a knife to her throat and threatened to kill her. Our local judge, in his infinite wisdom, refused a restraining order on the ex-boyfriend and released him on his own recognizance (the judge thought his violence was somehow her fault). So three days ago he shot her and her new boyfriend to death; the bodies were discovered by the woman's ten-year-old daughter. Nice. And people say feminists have too much power?

Yet Another One Bites the Dust

On Wednesday, it was rumored over at Lets Run that Ohio University's men's track program would be eliminated. On Thursday, the official announcement came (men's swimming and women's lacrosse got it too) followed by a press conference. I sat on this one for a few days so I could try to find out a bit more.

The usual reasons were given: finances and Title IX. The AP wirestory ran all over the state said it was necessary to "meet a federal requirement regarding athletic scholarships", which isn't what was said either in the release or at the press conference. Only participation proportionality was cited. Either way, it's a canard; cutting a women's sport does not improve any kind of male-female ratio. Furthermore, the AD's hand was not forced on the issue, as federal regulations give schools a number of options. And an early story on Swimming World's website said OU was already in compliance with Title IX, although its reference is nowhere to be found at the student newspaper's wesbite. My best guess is that university administrators told the students to do a re-write.

As far as the money issues go, I'd really like it if an accountant would get involved in this, because the numbers each side uses are widely different. OU's AD Kirby Hocutt said the university could save as much as $685,000 per year from the cuts. However, the numbers filed with the federal Office of Post-Secondary Education showed a total operating budget of only $223,854 for the affected sports, not all of which has even been cut (XC is included in track totals). Hocutt referred to a $14.7 million annual budget, while his numbers sent to the feds show $16.7 million; Hocutt said the total 3-year deficit is around $4 million, while his numbers sent to the feds have balanced books.

Regardless, the best-case scenario has these cuts closing only half of Hocutt's financial gap. Nor does he mention the revenue OU will lose from these cuts--the NCAA distributes some of its money to schools by the number of sports and scholarships they offer. OU will lose out on over $70,000 sent from Indianapolis.

However, when anyone does future financial figures at a state university in Ohio it looks very bleak. Athletic departments are immune to this except for one glaring hole: scholarships. Tuition in Ohio costs 47% more than the national average. A full scholarship now costs well in excess of $10,000, whereas mine at BGSU fifteen years ago was less than half that.

The 800-pound gorilla in all of this is football, as with every school that makes these kinds of cuts. OU's situation warrants some special mention. Long a bottom-dweller in the MAC, OU's football program made many changes over the past few years. In 2001, the track was removed from Peden Stadium, the field lowered, and seating increased at a cost of $2.8 million. In 2005, OU hired Frank Solich (currently paid $262,172 annually), the former head coach at Nebraska. Just two months into his first season, he got into some hot water. OU became a regular on conference football broadcasts and just this year went to its first bowl game in 38 years.

To which the ordinary person responds, "Hey! They're making a lot of money now!" Actually, not really. The MAC's TV contract revenues are split equally among all conference members regardless of whether they're featured or not (and hosting a TV crew can sometimes add considerable expense). The same goes for the bowl appearance; OU pays its bowl-related expenses and then turns over the remainder of the $750,000 payout to the conference to again be split up equally. The only way to recoup increased football spending is through home ticket sales, merchandising, or going on the road and getting blown out by a big-time powerhouse. It will take OU a long time to get an additional $2.8 million out of that, just like BGSU is still paying off its $2.2 million stadium upgrade (which oddly enough occurred a few years before they killed off sports too).

Part of all this is the "stepping-stone" status of the MAC. It's Division 1-A, but barely. No one in a decision-making position takes a career job in a MAC school. If an AD upgrades the status of the football program while not appearing to run the school broke, he instantly makes himself more appealing to a big-time university. If he ticks off the locals and alumni and leaves the place a wreck, it's not his problem because he's not going to be there. As a friend on the inside once said, D-1 athletic departments are snakepits.

UPDATE: An anonymous poster at Let's Run gives his version of events.

James Madison track cuts update

Way back in September, James Madison University announced it was cutting ten sports and (falsely) blamed Title IX. On Friday, a student group made its case against the cuts to the school's Board of Visitors. More or less, the students were politely told to shove it, and these cuts were going forward. It sounds oddly reminiscent of Bush's "listening tour"--pretend to take input, but in fact the already-decided plan of action will be implemented regardless.

What makes this battle interesting is the bull-headedness of the university's leadership. When other schools have sought to make cuts and useed Title IX as a smokescreen, they've at least been wise enough to couch it in wishy-washy language that doesn't use any specifics. JMU's leadership did otherwise:

On Sept. 29, the school announced it would drop seven men’s teams – archery, cross country, gymnastics, indoor track, outdoor track, swimming and wrestling – as well as three women’s teams – archery, fencing and gymnastics – because the school was not in compliance with Title IX, the 1972 law designed to guarantee equal opportunities for men and women.

JMU President Linwood H. Rose said then and again Friday that the school’s only option to comply with the law was to make sure its offerings were proportional to its enrollment...

First of all, it is ridiculous for anyone to assert that these cuts are solely for the purpose of balancing male/female numbers, since three of the ten affected sports are women's teams. But also, as I've pointed out before, current DOE regulations give institutions the option of using any one of three methods for showing compliance in the area of participation. Proportionality is not required, which student board member Stacy Fuller aknowledged:

Fuller said women’s equestrian and water polo both have interest in becoming varsity sports, which would prevent JMU from meeting the third prong of the law, allowing schools to demonstrate it meets the interest of its student body.

Rose and Damico said JMU also can’t meet the second prong, which says that a school is in compliance if it demonstrates progress in the area of expanding opportunities for women.

Rose said JMU doesn’t have a continuing history of adding opportunities for female athletes, in part because Madison started as a women’s college and had a healthy complement of women’s sports from the beginning.

The first of these two assertions proves the mendacity of the second. If two women's teams wish to become varsity sports, then it most certainly is possible to add opportunities for female athletes. The truth is that the athletic department decision-makers do not wish to spend any more money on women's sports, as women don't play football or men's basketball. I find it highly unlikely that either of those two programs have been asked to share the sacrifice.

The affected students are vowing a lawsuit. These kinds of actions generally go in favor of the universities; they simply play to "run out the clock" and the students give up once they're out of school. But if something does come out of this, JMU could get a serious black eye. JMU is a state school and Virginia does have a Freedom of Information Act, and the behind-the-scenes paperwork cannot possibly match the public statements.

Clarion University Drops Track

...and, of course, blames Title IX. (Clarion is a D-II school in the Penn State system.)

The issue is usually complex when teams are cut, but in general it comes down to the fact that football gobbles up gobs of money and other sports die to feed it. Title IX is only involved in that women's sports, already generally ignored and underfunded, don't get the axe.

Pittsburgh Post-Gazette sports columnist Sherry Anderson muddies the issues when she takes the AD's word at face value. At the very least, she reveals her near ignorance of both small-college sports and Title IX.

She lists the recent expansion of women's sports at Clarion, yet parrot's the AD's talking point that the school could fail to show "a history and continuing practice of expanding women's opportunities". Obviously, it can, and so any proportionality issues are a moot point. (Clarion's new release incorrectly states proportionality is a requirement; the law is well enough known that this can only be a deliberately false statement.)

Anderson also suggests that football be taken out of the Title IX equation. First of all, four separate attempts to do just that have been rejected by Congress. Secondly, she states that "Clarion operates below [the] NCAA [limit] of 90 players", but doesn't give us any perspective on the issue. Some digging shows that Clarion's football team actually did have 90 players last year, while the other five men's sports now remaining had 62 athletes between them.

But the icing on the cake is this: "Add a caveat, such as requiring that a school show that its football program is in the black and some of that revenue is used for women's programs." There are somewhere in the range of 60 or so schools in all of college football that actually make money, and none of them are cutting any sports. (Hint: if a profitable team isn't in the Pac-10, Big XII, Big Ten, ACC or SEC, it better be named Notre Dame.) If Clarion's football team were able to make a profit, they wouldn't have cut a thing.

Here's the point to Title IX, which people don't understand. Agencies which recieve federal monies are required to treat men and women equally for the simple reason that they are taxed at the same rate.

Good Riddance

Today's Toledo Blade reports Greg Christopher of Purdue University will be Bowling Green State University's new athletic director, replacing the outgoing Paul Krebs. The Blade, for the first time I'm aware of, made reference to Krebs' hatchet job at BGSU, stating "he led makeovers for several of the school’s athletic programs".

In case you don't remember, Krebs basically started the trend on cutting track programs at Division 1-A universities (he took out men's swimming and tennis as well). At least a dozen other universities followed his lead, four of them in the MAC alone. Of course, he sold the cuts as fiscal responsibility and adherence to Title IX, which were classic examples of administrative Newspeak; actually he decimated the athletic department's finances and BGSU's female athletes are worse off now than when he arrived.

I knew that the track teams would never come back as long as Krebs was here, but I have little hope even now. Let's just all give Krebs the "you're number one" sign as he leaves town.