Recent News

NCAA SUSPENDS SCHOLARSHIP RULE UNTIL JANUARY
New $2,000 allowance on hold as override tally hits 125 schools
December 15, 2011 -- The new rule allowing Division I institutions to give some student-athletes an additional $2,000 miscellaneous expense allowance has been suspended until the Board of Directors convenes in January. The reasons the schools cited fell into four areas: how quickly it was implemented, perceived impact on competitive equity, application of the allowance for student-athletes in equivalency sports and implications for Title IX. Read the full article at ncaa.com.

NACWAA ACTION REGARDING RECENTLY PASSED NCAA DIVISION I REFORM
NACWAA Working Group Updates
December 9, 2011  
November 15, 2011 

SPLIT DECISION IN DECADE-LONG UC-DAVIS TITLE IX LAWSUIT
A 10-year ongoing Title IX lawsuit came to an end on August 3, 2011, when Federal Judge Frank C. Damrell ruled that the University of California at Davis did not discriminate against a group of female wrestlers, but that it violated Title IX because the number of women playing sports fell significantly while the plaintiffs were in college. Both sides are claiming victory, but the case may have implications for other colleges and into the future as it brought forward a new courtroom interpretation in assessing the second prong of schools' three-part Title IX participation test. Read more at InsideHigherEd.com and see more about this suit below.

FGCU TITLE IX CASE DECIDED IN FAVOR OF THE UNIVERSITY
After months in the court system, Bonnie Yegidis Title IX lawsuit against Florida Gulf Coast University was decided by a jury in favor of FGCU. Yegidis, the former Provost at FGCU, filed suit in 2007 after she was forced to resign for, what she claimed, was raising concerns about sex discrimination at the school. Three others lawsuits against FGCU regarding similar claims were recently settled out of court for $4.2 million. In Yegidis’ case, the jury determined that there was not sufficient evidence linking her forced resignation to her bringing attention to claims of sex discrimination at the University. The act of filing Title IX complaints or raising Title IX concerns is a protected action and one cannot be fired for doing so. But, in this case, the jury determined that Yegidis’ forced resignation was not the result of her bringing attention to Title IX complaints. Read more.

DELAWARE STATE TITLE IX LAWSUIT DECIDED
On December 21st, 2010, a Delaware judge ruled that Delaware State University must reinstate its women’s equestrian team. The team was cut 11 months ago along with men’s tennis in order to help the school save money. However, with a female enrollment of nearly 60 percent and only 44 percent of the school’s athletes being female, a Title IX suit was filed. The team will be reinstated for the foreseeable future, and Delaware State University is being forced to pay nearly $500,000 in court and attorney fees.

UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA DAVIS TITLE IX SUIT
On December 13th, 2010, a circuit court judge ruled that four officials at the University of California, Davis will face Title IX charges in relation to a 2003 case involving female wrestlers. Among the individuals that will face charges are former Senior Women Administrator Pam Gill-Fisher and Athletics Director Greg Warzecka. The suit charges that officials knowingly allowed gender discrimination within the athletics department to persist. Read more.

NATIONAL WOMEN’S LAW CENTER RELEASES TITLE IX WEBINAR AUDIO
Watch the webinar that was given by the National Women’s Law Center on Title IX.

NATIONAL WOMEN’S LAW CENTER FILES 12 TITLE IX COMPLAINTS
In November 2010, the National Women’s Law Center filed administrative complaints with the Department of Education alleging that high schools in a dozen selected school districts across the country do not offer equal opportunity to female athletes. Read the full story.

This action is part of the Rally for Girls’ Sports: She’ll Win More Than a Game campaign that was recently launched by the Center. It focuses on advocacy and education to parents related to high school level athletics. Read a brief description of the campaign and the text of the administrative complaints that were filed.

CLARIFICATION OF QUINNIPIAC CASE
By Linda Carpenter and R. Vivian Acosta

The July 2010 federal court decision in the Quinnipiac University Title IX case (review the full court decision) provides clear and useful information not just for Quinnipiac University but for the rest of us as well. The news headlines relating to the case generally refer solely to some aspect of whether competitive cheer is a sport or not. The case has much broader significance than that.

First, let’s start with a bit of background. Many schools have decided to cut teams as a way of meeting budgetary constraints or reconfiguring a program. Some schools have cut teams as a way of manipulating the ratio of male to female athletes in an attempt to appear closer to complying with Title IX’s requirement to provide equal access to participation opportunities.

In 2009, Quinnipiac decided to terminate its women’s volleyball team, as well as men’s golf and men’s outdoor track, while adding a women’s competitive cheer team. Remember, Title IX is unconcerned about thenumber of teams but is rather focused on the number of participants. The proposed new team, competitive cheer, can carry a very large roster of participants. So if the competitive cheer team became a reality, the new team would help Quinnipiac look as though it was closer to compliance.

Whether competitive cheer is a ‘sport’ for Title IX counting purposes is a question that has been broadly debated but never concretely decided. The Office for Civil Rights has issued a list of rather subjective criteria that an activity needs to meet in order to be considered a sport for Title IX purposes (OCR Criteria). In the Quinnipiac case, if competitive cheer is considered a ‘sport’ for Title IX purposes, it makes it easier for Quinnipiac to look like it is complying with Title IX. The court’s decision on this issue was that Quinnipiac’s competitive cheer group may, in the future, be a sport, but it does not yet fulfill the needed criteria. Note that the decision talks about Quinnipiac’s cheer team, not all cheer teams on other campuses. However, it is unlikely that competitive cheer groups found on other campuses would meet the criteria with any greater success.

The “sportness” of competitive cheer was not the solitary issue of the decision, nor perhaps even the most important. Quinnipiac did not place all its hopes on being able to count its competitive cheer participants as participants for Title IX’s sake. In addition, early in the case Quinnipiac was apparently intentionally but inappropriately manipulating and misreporting the actual number of male and female participants by setting artificial floors and ceilings for various team memberships and by altering those limits before and after the reporting date. Furthermore, Quinnipiac tried to clone its female track participants, at least for the sake of a Title IX count, by seeming to have many of them fully participate in indoor, outdoor and cross country track teams when, in reality, many of the female track athletes did not participate due to injury or being red shirted. Additionally, the court noted that the indoor and outdoor teams were merely adjuncts to the cross country team. None of these methods of inflating the numbers is unique to Quinnipiac. Many schools incorporate similar strategies in order to linger longer in discriminatory behaviors. The court was not fooled by the strategies and found, in sum, that Quinnipiac was in violation of Title IX’s equal access to participation requirement.

Both issues, competitive cheer’s ‘sportness’ and roster manipulation have now been specifically and firmly addressed with clarity. Although the decision of the court in this particular case does not carry precedent value to the jurisdictions of other federal districts, it should serve as a very strong warning to schools who are still choosing to use strategies of obfuscation and misrepresentation to look like they are complying with the 38-year old law known as Title IX rather than doing the lawful as well as right thing for their students.

Please see below to access articles and opinions regarding the Quinnipiac Case:

NCAA
Women’s Sports Foundation
Inside Higher Education
The New York Times
USA Today

OCR RESCINDS 2005 TITLE IX CLARIFICATION: A VICTORY FOR TITLE IX
By Lisa Nash, NACWAA

As many of you already know, on Tuesday, April 20th, 2010, the United States Department of Education issued a statement revoking the 2005 Title IX clarification regarding the use of e-mail or internet surveys to gauge interest in athletic programs.

According to the 1972 Title IX law, discrimination based on sex at institutions that receive federal funds is prohibited. In the realm of athletics, schools can prove compliance with the participation component of Title IX in one of three ways:

1. Demonstrate that participation opportunities are substantially proportional in relation to male/female enrollment ratio.
2. Show a continued growth and expansion of programs offered to the traditionally underrepresented sex.
3. Prove that the interests and abilities of the underrepresented sex have been fully accommodated.

In 2005, the Office for Civil Rights, which oversees the enforcement of Title IX, issued a clarification regarding the interest and abilities, or third prong. The 2005 clarification indicated that issuing an online or e-mail survey to students was a complete and accurate means by which to assess interest in athletic participation. In addition, the clarification allowed institutions to classify a non-response to the survey as an indication of lack of interest in participation. The 2005 clarification was decried by Title IX proponents as a loophole that institutions could utilize to weaken their enforcement of gender equity in athletics programs.

This Tuesday, April 20th, Vice President Joe Biden, on behalf of the Office for Civil Rights of the Department of Education issued a statement withdrawing the 2005 clarifications and closing the aforementioned loophole. This policy change by the Office for Civil Rights indicates an important shift towards stricter enforcement of Title IX and a decisive move towards achieving gender equity in our nation’s athletics programs.

View the full text of the letter released from the Office of the Assistant Secretary of the Office for Civil Rights.

Please see below to access articles and opinions regarding the rescission of the 2005 Title IX clarification:

Title IX Dear Colleague Letter
Office for Civil Rights clarifications of Title IX Dear Colleague Letter
NCAA
Chronicle of Higher Education
New York Times
CNN
USA Today