Gateway to FBS, Would we go?

[Bisonguy]

We might be able to use the third prong while we're FCS, but I think the additional 15-20 men's scholarships would really be asking for a lawsuit. We're already dangerously close to one in regards to facilities. Beyond just scholarships, Title IX also requires the quality and condition of the practice, training and locker facilities to be relatively equal between sports of the same tier. Can anyone honestly say that the WBB and VB facilities are equal to FB? The BSA renovation and improvements to the BBF cannot come fast enough.

Why would the facilities of WBB and VB need to compare to that of FB?

WBB facilities are already equivalent to that of MBB, VB is comparable to wrestling. Until those sports start bringing in nearly 100k people per year at $20/seat, they're not on the same tier as football.

Would NDSU have to add a women's sport if they move to FBS? No

Should NDSU add a women's sport if they move to FBS? Yes



I just wish NDSU was in a situation like WKU where they moved to FBS due to Title IX!!!

[56BISON73]

If the conference were to make that move it would be foolish not to. PL

[tjbison]

I agree 100% with you all, i've been following the talk of this on all the message boards and most seem to think that NDSU/SDSU would not be included, but then they go and say that they can see NDSU in the MVC in a few years. Either way we are in a good position right now, with a fun future to talk about.

[Hammersmith]

Why would the facilities of WBB and VB need to compare to that of FB?

WBB facilities are already equivalent to that of MBB, VB is comparable to wrestling. Until those sports start bringing in nearly 100k people per year at $20/seat, they're not on the same tier as football.

Would NDSU have to add a women's sport if they move to FBS? No

Should NDSU add a women's sport if they move to FBS? Yes



I just wish NDSU was in a situation like WKU where they moved to FBS due to Title IX!!!

They actually do need to compare. I stumbled across the NCAA handbook to Title IX a few days ago and learned a few new things. In the handbook, they talked about tiers of sports. I think they're more like guidelines, but they illustrate the point well. A tier 1 sport would be one that gives out 100% of the possible aid. A tier 2 would be one that gives out around 50%. A tier 3 would give out <25%. In each tier, there should be proportionality. For example: Let's assume a university with a perfect 50/50 balance of male and female undergrads. If there are 50 men involved in tier 1 sports, there should be 50 women also involved in tier 1 sports. As you can imagine, football does some really bad things to tier 1 calculations. I would bet that NDSU considers WBB, VB, soccer and softball all to be tier 1 for the purposes of gender equity. If you put FB and MBB on the other side, you get approximately 105 male athletes and 61 female athletes participating at NDSU. It's still not great, but it's about as good as NDSU can do(the actual scholarship numbers are different, but I don't have the info on exactly how many scholarships are awarded in each sport).

Within each tier, there should be similar numbers of coachs, amounts and conditions of practice equipment, facilities, recruiting budgets, etc. Now we know that things will never be perfect, but an honest attempt should be made. If a school is going to use prongs 2 or 3, they had better do a damn sight more than just attempt if they don't like courtrooms.

I realize that there are a lot of people on this site that will disagree with the NCAA on this, but remember that we're dealing with decades upon decades of discrimination and marginalization of women's athletics. If things had been handled better in the past, there wouldn't be such a wide discrepency in the popularity between men's and women's sports. Even in just the Title IX-era, there have been huge improvements. Those improvements deserve to continue, and that requires an honest attempt at equity in all things athletic.

[/soapbox] (Man, I'm doing that a lot this weekend; must have too much time on my hands.)


Gender Equity in Intercollegiate Athletics(NCAA .pdf)

[Hammersmith]

(There's a touch of politics in this, but it's necessary due to the topic.)

I want to add one other thing to my Title IX dissertation. There's a difference between the NCAA interpretation of Title IX and the government's interpretation that I did not make clear. In 1996, under the Clinton administration, the Department of Education issued a clarification that reaffirmed Title IX and even strengthened it a bit. In 2005, the DoE under Bush, issued an Additional Clarification that weakened parts of Title IX a good deal. There was a strong attempt to gut it, but that failed when two prominent members of the commission went public with a strongly dissenting minority opinion and several other members of the commission said that the final report that was delivered to the DoE had changes that they had not approved. Public backlash caused the commission's leaders to backpedel and the damage to Title IX was minimized. Still, the government branch that handles Title IX enforcement now has a mess on their hands. They've got two clarifications that confict with each other in several important areas and the 2005 Additional Clarification seems to contridict some case law. If it's not overturned through legislation, it will eventually be tested in court. The outcome is unknown.

The NCAA does not support the 2005 Additional Clarification and urges its members to use the 1996 Clarification instead. This is important to NDSU because the 2005 Additional Clarification directly impacts the "interests and abilities" prong of Title IX. Under the new guidelines, it's very difficult to force a school to add a women's sport. Effectively, prong 3 becomes a haven for those schools who wish to evade compliance. While it would save NDSU money to take that route, it's my opinion that it wouldn't be ethical and that it could come back to bite us in the ass if and when it's overturned. But that's just my(unimportant) opinion.

[Bisonguy]

I'm still going with test #3 for not having to add additional aid for a women's sport if NDSU goes FBS:

In other words, there is only a
participation issue under Title IX where it can be shown that there are (most
often) women waiting, ready and able to participate in athletics and where men
already occupy a disproportionate number of the existing participation
opportunities. Where an institution can show that it has fully accommodated the
interests and abilities of the under-represented sex, it may continue to add
participation opportunities for the over-represented sex without running afoul of
the law.

(page 26)

Facilities, yes, many need improvement, however:

It is of course
understandable that a new facility that houses certain sports may clearly outshine
an older facility that houses others on the same campus. The key is that access to the new facility should still be as equitable as possible.

(page 50)
Football locker rooms, etc. are obviously the most recently renovated and will be the most up to date until the BSA/BBF are renovated. An argument could be pretty easily made that the football locker rooms previously were one of the worst facilities on campus.

I'm still in favor of adding Equestrian at NDSU ( which I stated on here nearly five years ago). Not due to NDSU possibly moving to FBS, but rather because there's a need for it (plus more benefits for NDSU than any other option).




My issue isn't with Title IX itself, it's with those that think 'direct proportionality' as soon as they hear 'Title IX'. As you've proven with your linky, there's a lot more to it than that.

[TheBisonator]

Why the hell would the idiots on that board think we wouldn't move up with them to FBS?? Didn't they witness our top-notch facilities and see our thrashing of their Redbirds last season??

NDSU Football has a lot of respect to play for this year.

[NDSU1980]

More football scholarships. Can you say equestrian?

Hell, maybe they should add some equestrian sport just to keep an old An Sci grad like you happy. :>)

[NDSU1980]

One only has to look at the old NCC to see what happens when the entire conference doesn't move up together. I would think that in a growing Fargo economy we can swing the extra scholy dollars. Big question is, how big a chance is there that the Gateway will actually follow through and do this. Is any of this coming from AD's, or is it all message board chit chat?

[56BISON73]

One only has to look at the old NCC to see what happens when the entire conference doesn't move up together. I would think that in a growing Fargo economy we can swing the extra scholy dollars. Big question is, how big a chance is there that the Gateway will actually follow through and do this. Is any of this coming from AD's, or is it all message board chit chat?

Message board chit chat.
But the situation is much different than the old NCC days so thats really not a good analogy. But the scienarios of conference, auto bids scheduling etc would be the same and which would make sense to have the conference move as a whole. PL