WAG College gymnastics and homeschooling

[jenjean70]

College football is the third most popular sport in the US after professional football and professional baseball. Yes college football is more popular- much more, than most professional sports in America. Other college sports are not even in the same galaxy. The idea football (immensely popular, even beloved, drawing a racially and ethnically diverse athlete student body to American colleges) would have rationally been sacrificed by university administrations trying to come into compliance with IX rather than men's swimming, wrestling or gymnastics defies logic. It was never going to happen. And the merits of the sport itself (or lack thereof) has nothing to do with it.

Title IX has done good. This is proven by the numbers. It has also done harm. Also proven by the numbers. These facts can coexist- no one is trying to turn this into a "women's sports problem" except those who think rational criticism of Title IX and the call for some common sense reform of Title IX is anti-women. It isn't. In fact Title IX compliance (if it were enforced equitably, and it usually isn't) would also act to reduce and eliminate college programs that are more popular among women than men.

But Title IX is a men's sports problem. Virtually every men’s collegiate sport- including baseball- has lost programs due to Title IX. In the case of some sports, including MAG, the harmful impact of Title IX is likely irreparable and is felt in every level and aspect of the sport. MAG lost 80% of its college programs since passage of Title IX. As a result, American men's gymnastics as a whole is barely holding on.

Yes. Our coach said that in the next 10 years there will probably not be any men's teams left.

 

[Jard.the.gymnast]

As a non American, what is title IX or whatever it is called?

 

[wandrewsjr]

As a non American, what is title IX or whatever it is called?

It is a federal law passed in 1972. It states:

No person in the United States shall, on the basis of sex, be excluded from participation in, be denied the benefits of, or be subjected to discrimination under any education program or activity receiving Federal financial assistance.

In relation to sports, it has been interpretated to mean that colleges that receive any federal aid(which is virtually all in the US) must offer the same athletic opportunities to women as they do to men. This has meant the addition of many sports opportunities for women in the decades since. But has also led to the elimination of some men's teams at some schools (men's track, tennis, swimming, wrestling, gymnastics) mostly because football takes up so many team roster spots, universities in some cases have chosen to eliminate some men's sports to "balance the numbers" with the women's sports roster spots.

 

[Muddlethru]

I think what is deceiving by saying "Most L10's bound for college go to regular school" is that people think they always went to regular school. To me it seems most girls that go to college and get to L10 early (Say grades 8&9) are homeschooled during those crucial middle school years. That ALLOWS them to get to L10 early b/c they do intensive training. Then once they are there they go back to regular school. They weren't there the entire time.

My daughter and every other L10 I know did regular school since kindergarten. She was a Level 10 at 8th grade. I think the distinction is elite bound athletes tend to be homeschooled at some point but not those on the regular path.

 

[Madden3]

Just to be very clear- Personally? I am completely indifferent to football. No member of my family has ever played football or even watches football. In fact I am not a sports fan in any way, never have been. I am only in recent years a gymnastics fan of sorts- quite a lazy one- because my kids are gymnasts.

My post was not a defense of football as a sport. I am pointing out it is incorrect to blame football programs for the reduction in other men’s sports programs or the dramatic demise of some men’s sports in America that occurred after passage of Title IX.

No sport offered exclusively for women eats up anything remotely close to football's average roster of 103 men. If a university is to provide equal opportunities for men and women to play sports, the calculation of numbers of athletes and costs will force a decision between football and other men's sports. It's simple math. Once you do that math, then you can start thinking about whether a school should field a football team and a couple other men's sports or field a wider array of men's sports. .

Exactly. It is simple math. The result of the law- perhaps not in how it is written but as a result of how it has been enforced and implemented- is a de facto quota system. So yes, choices had to be made- because of Title IX. But this does not make the loss of other men's sport teams football's fault- If a college is given a Sophie's choice, the surviving child cannot be blamed for the result.

I also dislike the “it’s football’s fault” argument because it pits one sport and its athletes against another. All over this country there are boys who work hard and dream of playing college football- just as our gymnast sons work hard and may dream of being college gymnasts. I do not like the "my sport is better than your sport" game when the consequence for the loser is elimination by federal statute.

A simple solution would have been to exempt football programs from Title IX. I made the case in my other post for why football is unique and an obvious outlier when it comes to college sport programs. And as you say, it has no significant female equivalent or counterpart. Taking football programs out of the equation would have allowed universities to increase athletic opportunities for women just as they have since passage of IX, while maintaining them for men.

I would also add that I understand that several factors might come into play when a university decides to eliminate a sports program. Measures of popularity and success for example. But I would argue that here again, the trail of destruction leads back to Title IX.

When a sport as a whole loses college teams, this impacts every facet of the sport. Fewer college teams means fewer athletes stay with the sport. This means both fewer coaches coming up through the ranks, and a smaller high level athlete pool, which leads to a reduction in international success in that sport for the country. This lack of success reduces the sport's overall popularity. Fewer coaches and lower popularity causes a reduction in pre-college boys gymnastics programs, and the surviving college programs become even less popular and successful and all that more ripe for the chopping block. So, even more college teams are eliminated, there are even fewer coaches, even less international success, even less popularity- more college teams are eliminated- and on and on. This is how the result if not the intent of Title IX was to send men's gymnastics in the US into a death spiral.

 

[raenndrops]

Just to be very clear- Personally? I am completely indifferent to football. No member of my family has ever played football or even watches football. In fact I am not a sports fan in any way, never have been. I am only in recent years a gymnastics fan of sorts- quite a lazy one- because my kids are gymnasts.

My post was not a defense of football as a sport. I am pointing out it is incorrect to blame football programs for the reduction in other men’s sports programs or the dramatic demise of some men’s sports in America that occurred after passage of Title IX.



Exactly. It is simple math. The result of the law- perhaps not in how it is written but as a result of how it has been enforced and implemented- is a de facto quota system. So yes, choices had to be made- because of Title IX. But this does not make the loss of other men's sport teams football's fault- If a college is given a Sophie's choice, the surviving child cannot be blamed for the result.

I also dislike the “it’s football’s fault” argument because it pits one sport and its athletes against another. All over this country there are boys who work hard and dream of playing college football- just as our gymnast sons work hard and may dream of being college gymnasts. I do not like the "my sport is better than your sport" game when the consequence for the loser is elimination by federal statute.

A simple solution would have been to exempt football programs from Title IX. I made the case in my other post for why football is unique and an obvious outlier when it comes to college sport programs. And as you say, it has no significant female equivalent or counterpart. Taking football programs out of the equation would have allowed universities to increase athletic opportunities for women just as they have since passage of IX, while maintaining them for men.

I would also add that I understand that several factors might come into play when a university decides to eliminate a sports program. Measures of popularity and success for example. But I would argue that here again, the trail of destruction leads back to Title IX.

When a sport as a whole loses college teams, this impacts every facet of the sport. Fewer college teams means fewer athletes stay with the sport. This means both fewer coaches coming up through the ranks, and a smaller high level athlete pool, which leads to a reduction in international success in that sport for the country. This lack of success reduces the sport's overall popularity. Fewer coaches and lower popularity causes a reduction in pre-college boys gymnastics programs, and the surviving college programs become even less popular and successful and all that more ripe for the chopping block. So, even more college teams are eliminated, there are even fewer coaches, even less international success, even less popularity- more college teams are eliminated- and on and on. This is how the result if not the intent of Title IX was to send men's gymnastics in the US into a death spiral.

The actual goal of Title IX was to get more college sports opportunities for women. Instead, SOME schools just reduced the number of opportunities for men.
The "revenue making" sports were kept. Those that don't bring in the revenue were cut.
At my alma mater, I found the following single game ticket prices... Basketball and gymnastics tickets can be bought for a discount at group rate prices (not reflected in these prices) AND children 2 and under and the university students are free with their school ID.
None of these apply to Football... but students CAN buy season tickets (and legally sell the tickets they wont be using).

Football ticket = $52 - $215
Men's Basketball ticket = $14 - $57
Women's Basketball ticket = $5 - $15
Women's Gymnastics ticket = $8 - $11

 

[Madden3]

Yes, my point exactly. When forced by Title IX to chose, colleges perfectly understandably tended to keep more intact the more popular sport programs. One measure of their relative popularity is what one can charge for a ticket. That's how markets work.

There is a university not too far from us that has a men's gymnastics team (One of the 16 left in the country) and a women's gymnastics team. Women's meets cost $10 for an adult non-student, and the Men's program has no ticket sales at all. It is not even listed on the ticket sales page. Because the MAG meets are always free and anyone is welcome to just walk in- presumably, because far fewer spectators are expected than at the WAG meets. Now, let's imagine a law was passed that forced the university to choose one of those programs for elimination. Should it use the relative popularity or relative revenue generated by the two teams as a factor? Or just flip a coin?

 

[profmom]

So it's fine to blame women's sports and but not to point out the obvious nature of football as a very expensive and roster-heavy outlier? And no, I am not OK with a solution that basically says let's just engineer a multimillion dollar exemption that exclusively benefits male athletes and coaches. If Title IX were eliminated tomorrow, I guarantee you that universities would not slap themselves across the foreheads, exclaim "our bad!", and restart men's gym and wrestling. They would immediately eliminate women's sports so that they can continue to feed the voracious maws of the marquee men's sports. That's the nature of the arms race underway right now.

Football doesn't make money for most schools. It loses money, even if you only look at the reported costs. Universities are by and large still too afraid of the hecklers' vetoes to cut it or even to limit rosters or say we're not going to build the new multimillion dollar stadium or hire the coach who will make far more than even the university's president. But once the concussion lawsuits get started in earnest, all of that will change. I give it around 20 years. Of course, by that time it will be very difficult to bring men's gym back.

I think part of the problem is that the implementation of federal legislation is an obvious change and people seek to attribute to that change all causal significance. This ignores the changes that have been occurring in individual sports, especially football, since the 1960s. Here's an interesting story that notes that the 1961 Alabama championship team would take 50-55 guys on the road. https://www.theatlantic.com/enterta...complex-college-football-then-and-now/263200/
https://www.theatlantic.com/enterta...complex-college-football-then-and-now/263200/
It's also important to remember that ticket sales do not happen in a vacuum. Athletic departments make decisions about which sports to market and how to invest their resources. At many universities, even a football team with a very poor record will get most of those resources. Why? Because they need to sell as many tickets as possible to help defray the costs of the arena, the coaching staff, the team travel, etc. etc. etc. Very quickly path dependence develops and prior choices justify continuing to invest in the same manner. Once the white elephant is home, it has to be fed and stabled, be damned the consequences for anyone else. The same strategies apply in soliciting alumni donations. So the alumni/development office puts a ton of time and energy into cultivating donations to support one sport and then sighs that people only seem to want to give to support that sport. I've seriously seen this argument made! "Why won't people give to support the university libraries?" "Well, let's just look at the website -- hmm, here's the big button to donate to athletics, but the library isn't even mentioned. How interesting." (And yes, I am SUPER irritated right now about this one, given the INSANE shenanigans I had to go through to give small donations to a history department and an institute for women's studies at a school with a top-tier D1 sports program a few days ago.)

A lot of this is driven by the choices that universities make. Title IX does not force any college to choose not to market certain sports or to eliminate men's sports. It's not random happenstance or a mysterious invisible hand that enables Utah sells out its women's gymnastics meets. Lacrosse is a highly visible sport at an institution I know. Another has a very hot equestrian team with a passionate following.

I just don't see how anyone can look at these numbers (which aren't even current!) and not acknowledge that football is a significant piece of the problem. https://www.hustlebelt.com/mac-foot...l-coaching-salaries-does-more-money-translate

 

[aerials]

I used to love football a lot too, so I know this is hard. Hell, I wore a black armband when Art Modell stole the Browns from Cleveland.

Are you from Ohio?

 

[kecks]

the problem is eduaction in the us is treated as a service, so rules of market aply, as their sports programs are treated like assets or branches of a big company, which the university thinks it is, a company that has to make profit. so rules of market aply again and these crazy tutions can exist. solution is simple: education is never a service. education is just a human right and a state has the responsibility to protect this right of its citizens. state needs monexy to do this meaning taxes need to be paid. the us has in many poor regions an education system that looks like the one of developing nation while other schools are beyond exellent. my european mind does not understand this fear of "government control" and "socialism" and this "market whorship". markets are just one tool, they do not get the best result for everybody all the time.

so not "title whatever" hurts college sports. this market worship does.

 

[gymgal]

the problem is eduaction in the us is treated as a service, so rules of market aply, as their sports programs are treated like assets or branches of a big company, which the university thinks it is, a company that has to make profit. so rules of market aply again and these crazy tutions can exist. solution is simple: education is never a service. education is just a human right and a state has the responsibility to protect this right of its citizens. state needs monexy to do this meaning taxes need to be paid. the us has in many poor regions an education system that looks like the one of developing nation while other schools are beyond exellent. my european mind does not understand this fear of "government control" and "socialism" and this "market whorship". markets are just one tool, they do not get the best result for everybody all the time.

so not "title whatever" hurts college sports. this market worship does.

Political talk is not allowed on CB. I am not a mod but I think the original topic was informative and would hate to have the thread locked due to the conversation turning into a political debate of capitalism vs socialism. It has already derailed into a conversation about Title IX

 

[coachmolly]

There are so many variables with public school/private school/home school and scholarship level gymnastics. I think a lot also depends on individual kids and just doing what's best for each one and constantly checking in with the NCAA to make sure everything checks out.
My brother is a high school teacher and currently has several students who are 9/10 gymnasts with college aspirations. They were fully home schooled for a few years and just started going back to public school for their main classes and picking up the rest online. It works because the school is super accommodating in allowing them to have a shortened day (which not all districts do) and giving them an online option. I'm not sure which program these girls use, but I do know the state offers a free cyber charter school and this particular district also offers several classes online for kids with special circumstances. These online classes have a teacher inside the brick and mortar school assigned to the class who checks in with students and is available for questions and support. I think teachers in each department rotate who gets the online classes each year. But I know those options would not have been available at the high school I attended.

 

[Madden3]

Hi, I have tried very hard to avoid overt political discussion and I am sorry if I have contributed to "derailing" the thread beyond what is typically appropriate. I have no desire to upset chalkbucket moderators so I am choosing to politely not respond to any post on the subject of Title IX past profmom's last, also this will be my last post on this thread.

To profmoms last- I do think I must point out that I have not once blamed "women's sports" for anything. In fact, my point from the start - and I think our central point of disagreement- is that singling out one sport (or group of sports) for derision, blame or elimination while championing others is neither accurate, fair, nor helpful. I also have not suggested the answer is to repeal Title IX. I do not know what the answer is, but we are never going to find answers if we cannot talk honestly about the negative aspects of Title IX. In my posts above, I have tried to provide a reasoned argument for at least looking honestly at the negative impact of Title IX on some men's sports. I hope I have done so and hope that anyone who wishes to explore the issue more deeply will take the time to do so.