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Show THE DAILY UTAH CHRONICLE - " WEDNESDAY, MARCH 27. J.ri-- VOn.,, TITLE continued from page 5 interests and abilities, which says that athletic opportunities for men and women must roughly equal the proportion of undergraduate students enrolled at the university, and that a school must take steps to expand such opportunities if they are found to be. lacking for one sex. Other program areas, which includes, according to the Iowa study, a wide range of "benefits, opportunities and treatments" afforded to sports participants, ranging from adequate practice time to availability of locker rooms to publicity from sports information personnel. The U.S. News and World Report viewed the U's athletics department as supportive enough of gender equity in women's sports to rank the school on its top-2- 0 Honor Roll, and Utah athletics director Chris Hill certainly feels that it's warranted. "We continue to expand scholarship opportunities for women, we're looking at new facilities for soccer and volleyball, and growing opportunities for women in other sports, including maybe adding another sport," Hill said. "I'm really happy for the hard work of our staff, our coaches and our athletes. We're very proud of this type of ranking.". So, it's worked fairly well at the U, but has Title IX similarly impacted publicly funded universities nation-Wide- ? "It's made a big statement," Hill said. "Now, each school must do the best it can on its own campus." So, how do all these other campuses stack up? There certainly have been increased opportunities for women to compete in sports, According to a study from the National Collegiate Athletic Association from Feb. 16, 1994, female participants in NCAA sports were to jump from 91,669 in 1984-8- 5 to 123,832 by 1995-9- 6 an increase of 35 percent. Dur ... . Jfafc ,: ing that same time, men's particiwent from 201,063 to !99.556 a decrease of 0.75 percent. Some would hail this as a victory for women, as there are 30,000 some-od- d more competing in NCAA varsity sports than were just a decade prior. Then again, there are still more than 65,000 fewer female college athletes than males. As for the second area, that of accommodation of interests and abilities, there has also been some improvement, and looking at the U specifically chronicles that. When a U Gender Equity Task Force was commissioned in 1995, the university was not yet fully in compliance with Title IX, specifically in regard to the athletics ratio mirroring the undergraduate population (which, back then was 5 for males, and now is pants male-fema- le 55-4- 54-46- ). .... Skttf f rffcl 111! Ill nil II III r la4 Ht thumb that we're making a good effort," according to Hill. "Whether it's altruism or because they're legally bound, I don't care-wo- men are treated equally here," Elliott said. "They have the same travel experiences, the same practice opportunities, the same chance to compete. Their experience is an equal experience. "There has truly been an effort to see what's real, evaluate it, and change what needs to be changed," she added. "There's been a commit- -' ment to doing the things that are necessary, and it's been genuine and ongoing." What constitutes less of an ongoing commitment however, is the money and expenditures devoted to women's athletics, and female coaching in particular. The third area of compliance, the "other program areas," includes coaches, "compensation of assistants and graduate assistants" and says that related benefits "are to be equivalent, but not necessarily identical." Well, according to statistics from the Iowa study, earnings between men's and women's coaches are nowhere near identical, and not much closer to equivalent. In 10 head or assistant coaching positions examined where there are equivalents of both men's and women's teams, men's coaches received the highest compensation in all of NCAA Division I seven times, and had greater median compensation nine out of 10 times (volleyball being the one exception). With some positions, it's almost to be expected. For instance, with media exposure and marketing opportunities, it was not surprising that? in '96-9the highest compensation for a men's head basketball coach was $900,000, while the highest women's was $344,000. The medians for the two were $290,000 and $98,400, respectively. In other sports, though, the disparity is nonsensical. In swimming, the highest men's is $115,000 or nearly double the women's high of ftuMfe Jtaii.- NCAA coaches-includi- ng the U's Majerus-maki- ng at least million per year. None of $1 them are women. Though the report issued by that task force stated that "a time of enrollmentbudget crunch" made it unfeasible and "counterproductive to divert other scholarship money into athletics just to achieve parity," it also outlined a list of steps to be taken to bring the U closer to the federal mandates. Among those were the formation of the women's soccer team, splitting membership of the ski team 0 between men and women, and an increased number of scholarships for women on the swimming, skiing and track and field teams. Today, there are 10 varsity women's sports at the U one more than the men have and the school is "within 5 percent of the undergrad ratio a rule of 50-5- male-fema- le 7, $57,684. ( - j - U of gymnastics turn, featuring Annsbtth Efctrle, is cnt tht cr.fy U women's teams to draw a crevrd. ll A V 1 . ' Mt MfW - 4kJ . .'-I-f .1 W 3nF ..... - "Sr Despite a Sweet 16 trip, Erin Gibbons snd Co. don't get much fan support. Meanwhile, the median personnel expenditure for men's sports was $1.9 million. For women, it was or less than half of what $431,282 was spent on football alone ($890,330). The U has not been exempt from this particular problem. The university's '95 Gender Equity Task Force found that "men's coaches account for 76 percent ($1.4 million) of total compensation by the program, compared to 24 percent ($453,518) for women. The average men's head coach received $95,711, compared to $41,149 for a women's head coach." Even taking into account the caveat that the men's figures were boosted substantially by the respective salaries of men's hoops coach Rick Majerus and football coach Ron McBride (in football, the median compensation for the head coach is $268,000), that indicates a gross difference. One so gross that the same U Task Force recommended "significant" increases in salary for the U's gymnastics, women's basketball, volleyball and Softball. Not that time has not healed these wounds. An article published by USA Today on Aug. 23, 2001 detailed that there are now 39 NCAA coaches including the U's Majerus making at least $1 million per year. None of them are womenv Elliott is making more now than she was then, but says pay for women's coaches still has a long way to go. Thi 111 e full-tim- e There are now 39 i 2002 9 "It wasn't equal in '95 and it's not equal now," she said. "There are many things that are equal in college sports salary is not one of them." In the meantime, female athletes continue to move towards equality with their male counterparts, obstructed all the way by persisting misconceptions and stereotypes. It is, after all, still considered an insult for a boy to be told by his peers that he throws like a girl. And while some of these walls of the testosterone psyche are coming down, with some women's sports seeing popularity growing, far too many still are undone by the playing of the sex card and the negative perceptions it engenders. The U's gymnastics team is an anomaly having averaged 9,920 fans in its six home meets this year good enough to garner its 19th attendance title in the last 21 years. Ranked fourth in the country, the team's success rate warrants such fan support. Success is not always an apt indicator which teams draw people in, however. Far more consistent with the standard is an examination of the U's respective basketball teams. During the 2000-0- 1 season, the men finished 22nd in the nation in attendance, averaging 12,236 fans in 16 2 home games, despite going overall and losing in the first round of the NIT. The women, by contrast, went 28-- 4 and advanced to the NCAA's Sweet 16, but brought in a paltry 1,409 people per its 18 home contests. "It used to just be hard personally, because I wanted to have a neat environment for the kids to play in, where they'd have a lot of people who appreciate seeing them play," Elliott said. "Now, it's gone beyond that it's a detriment to the girls of the program. When we can't offer community support, there's less to offer to potential recruits. And that affects the quality of the team." Hill says that the U is trying to change the situation. "We've put a lot more marketing 19-1- dollars into the women's programswe just haven't seen the fruits of that yet," he said. In the meantime, Elliott knows that, even with a federal provision mandating equality for women in schools, you can't mandate equality in the minds of random people. Not that she'll stop trying. "We haven't changed everybody's mind, but we have changed some," she added. "Hopefully, hat will continue." ewaldenchronicle.utah.edu |