Copyright 2002 The Denver Post 
All Rights Reserved  
The Denver Post
October 20, 2002 Sunday 1ST EDITION
SECTION: SPORTS; Pg. C-16

LENGTH: 1028 words

HEADLINE: Some claim Title IX hurting Olympic sports Dismantling teams limits medal hopes

BYLINE: John Meyer , Denver Post Sports Writer

BODY:
Unintended consequences of Title IX enforcement on college campuses  have become a threat to Olympic sports, a commission appointed by  Education Secretary Rod Paige will be told this week at hearings in  Colorado Springs.



'If you look at which sports have the most medal opportunities and  which sports are the best performers for the U.S. Olympic  Committee, those sports are track and field, wrestling and  swimming,' said Gary Abbott, director of special projects for USA  Wrestling. 'Those are the three sports that have been hammered the  hardest, or among the hardest, because of the Title IX cutbacks in  men's athletics.'



Paige created the Commission on Opportunity in Athletics this  summer to review the consequences of Title IX enforcement, which  critics say has advanced women's athletic opportunity at the  expense of nonrevenue men's sports. The 15-member panel was formed  as a response to those criticisms.



It will recommend to the secretary, in a written report in January,  whether enforcement standards should be revised. The panel includes  several collegiate athletic directors, Penn State University  President Graham Spanier, SEC commissioner Mike Slive and soccer  player Julie Foudy, who is president of the Women's Sports  Foundation. The commission is chaired by former WNBA star Cynthia  Cooper and Stanford athletic director Ted Leland.



Four town meetings around the country have been scheduled. Colorado  Springs was picked because of the impact Title IX has had on  Olympic sports. The Colorado Springs meeting will be held Tuesday  and Wednesday at the Cheyenne Mountain Resort.



Since 1982, the number of women competing in NCAA athletics  programs has more than doubled, but 59 Division I men's wrestling  programs have been abolished and 38 men's gymnastics programs have  been dropped.



'It decreases our pool of athletes that we have training at the  elite level,' said Ron Galimore, senior director of men's programs  for USA Gymnastics. 'When we lose collegiate programs, we lose the  ability to train that athlete long enough and support him doing  gymnastics the number of hours he needs to be doing it in order to  be competitive internationally.'



Commission member Donna de Varona, a prominent advocate for women's  athletics, wants to focus on solutions instead of blaming Title IX  or the way the Department of Education interprets the 1972  legislation which created it. Title IX is enforced by the  department's Office of Civil Rights.



'We know men's minor sports are being cut,' said de Varona, a  double gold medalist in swimming at the 1964 Tokyo Olympics.  'Whether it is because of unintended consequences or resource  allocation, the fact is they are. And some women's sports are being  cut, too. Many minor sports are in jeopardy. So, how can we look at  this environment and make it better for the athlete? I think we  need to look for ways to bring resources on the campus. No male  sport should be cut to come into compliance.'



In the past 20 years, 16 Division I women's swimming teams have  been added but 34 men's swimming teams have been dropped. Swimming  was stunned when UCLA eliminated its men's swimming team in 1993.



'Here's a school that had produced 20-plus Olympians, and they  dropped their men's program, not their women's program,' said  Chuck Wielgus, executive director of USA Swimming. 'It just sent  shock waves through the swimming community, going, 'How could this  happen?' It would be like Notre Dame dropping football.'



Title IX prohibits discrimination based on sex in education  programs or activities that receive federal funds. Under an  education department policy interpretation issued in 1979, colleges  must satisfy one of three criteria to meet Title IX requirements:



Offer athletic opportunity to men and women in numbers  'substantially proportionate' to their enrollment ratio.



Show a history and 'continuing practice' of expanding opportunity  for the 'underrepresented' sex.



Demonstrate the 'interests and abilities' of the underrepresented  sex have been accommodated.



Critics say the proportionality standard is flawed because the  proportion of women on a college campus does not necessarily  reflect the proportion of women who want to participate in  athletics. Women now make up about 55 percent of university student  bodies.



'We don't want people being denied opportunity because of a  mathematical quota system,' Abbott said. 'We'd like to build  women's athletics without taking away athletic opportunities for  boys and men that have actually proven they are involved in those  activities.'



Bob Boettner, president of the College Swim Coaches Association of  America based in Colorado Springs, said nonrevenue sports have lost  'a tremendous amount of opportunity' because of cuts intended to  produce proportionality.



'Title IX doesn't say women, it says students should have the  opportunity to participate,' Boettner said. 'Well, we've gone  into a whole reverse discrimination thing about it. The law is not  written for quotas, but that's how it's been enforced, because  that's how the Department of Education wrote their way of mandating  how the law should be applied.'



De Varona said Title IX was never intended to kill men's sports.



'It is the responsibility of athletic directors, and they have had  30 years to come into compliance, to accommodate both men and  women,' de Varona said. 'Whether you call it unintended  consequences and place the blame on proportionality or whether you  look at how athletic departments have decided to spend their  resources, (that) is what we're exploring as a commission.'



Most of the critics stress they support Title IX.



"I don't think anybody thinks Title IX is a bad law," Galimore  said. "It's a great law. It's afforded some wonderful  opportunities and education in athletics for women. But there is  something wrong when the opportunities are taken away from male  athletes."

GRAPHIC: PHOTO: Associated Press/Charlie Neibergall Cortney Bramwell steadies himself during a rings competition. In 1982 there were 59 men's varsity collegiate gymnastic programs. That number fell to 21 in 2001. Almost all have fallen victim to a combination of Title IX, budget cuts and a decreased emphasis on a sport that has traditionally struggled for attention, except for a few weeks every four years when the Olympics roll around. Playing with Title IX

LOAD-DATE: October 21, 2002