Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: TUESDAY, May 17, 1994 TAG: 9405170112
SECTION: SPORTS PAGE: SPORTS EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: By SCOTT BLANCHARD STAFF WRITER
DATELINE: LENGTH: Medium
Lacrosse will begin in the spring of 1995 and play on Tech's existing soccer field. Tech will build a field for the softball program, which begins play in the spring of 1996.
"Both are growing, both are popular, and ones we feel we can make an impact with, soon," said Tech assistant athletic director Steve Horton, who drafted the plan.
A student survey helped Tech settle on softball and lacrosse, both of which are represented in a lawsuit filed in January by a dozen women who wanted their club sports (including field hockey and crew) upgraded to varsity status. Tech doesn't consider its plan a response to the lawsuit, which will go to court in January barring a settlement. Talks are continuing.
"This plan has been in the works for quite awhile," Horton said. "It's finally been OK'd by the Board of Visitors."
Washington, D.C. lawyer Amy Sabrin, who represents the women in the lawsuit, said the plan is "definitely an improvement" in Tech's reaction to the original Title IX complaint last December. Then, Sabrin said, Tech was talking about five years to come into compliance and wouldn't commit to adding more than one sport.
"It's quite evident that they were motivated to move along in this direction by the lawsuit," Sabrin said. "This is way more than any indication we had when we first started talking."
Horton said Tech's male-female participation and scholarship ratios will be within three percent of the school's male-female enrollment percentage by 1996-97. By that time, Tech assistant athletic director Jeff Bourne said, Tech will have spent almost $3.2 million -including $112,000 to start its women's soccer program last fall - on new women's sports from '93-97. The money, including $125,000 for a softball field, will come from increased or re-allocated student athletic fees.
Title IX compliance, however, will take more than just adding two women's sports.
Participation numbers for men's sports -including football - will be limited to 95% of the 1992-93 NCAA average Division I squad size. All men's sports at Tech will face cuts in team size, although the cuts will affect only walk-ons, Horton said. Football will be limited to 112 athletes - 85 on scholarship and 27 walk-ons. In any case, Horton said, a new NCAA rule limits football teams to 105 players during preseason practice.
The eight existing women's sports will be required to maintain current levels of participation or meet the NCAA average for squad size or scholarships, whichever is higher. Title IX measures equity by money spent, Horton said, not money available - meaning, for example, that a team could be required to use all the scholarships at its disposal whether it wanted to or not. It is not uncommon for a team not to use all its scholarships every year.
No sports will be cut - probably. Tech's 11 existing men's sports are safe for now, but language in the plan leaves Tech the option to cut sports or take other measures if its female participation/scholarship numbers are out of whack or if the budget runs dry.
Scholarship budgets for men's sports will be frozen. Men's programs won't lose any scholarships, but those not funded to the NCAA maximum - track, wrestling, soccer and swimming - won't be anytime soon.
Endowed scholarships that are sport-specific could be targeted for reallocation from men's to women's programs if needed, but there are no current plans to do that, Horton said.
Softball and lacrosse will receive one-fourth of the NCAA maximum scholarships each season until they are fully funded, Horton said.
The plan grew out of an in-house study finished last fall that concluded Tech's opportunity ratio for women athletes was poor. According to Tech's figures, at the time the lawsuit was filed, Tech's enrollment was about 40 percent female, but only 27 percent of its playing berths were for women.
Tech modeled its plan after similar ones by the University of Texas, University of New Hampshire and the California State University system.
"We do some things nobody else has ever done," Horton said. "We limit men, and ask women to maintain a certain level."
by CNB