Many of the commission's recommendations involve the ways in which schools can demonstrate Title IX compliance. There are currently three ways to demonstrate compliance-having the same proportion of women participating in intercollegiate athletics as attending the institution, showing a historical and continuing commitment to expanding athletic opportunity for women, or "fully and effectively" meeting the athletic interest of women on campus.
The report will recommend that "the Office for Civil Rights should clarify the meaning of 'substantial proportionality' [as the existing legislation reads] and allow for reasonable variance in the relative ratios in the athletic participation of men and women while adhering to the nondiscriminatory tenets of Title IX," according to The Chronicle of Higher Education.
Several more specific recommendations will be made concerning who is counted when determining the proportionality of available collegiate athletic opportunities, according to The Chronicle. The panel will advise considering only those students who are recruited for athletics or who receive athletic scholarships. The report will also recommend counting the number of spots on teams available to women, rather than the actual number of women participating. Also, the report will say that "nontraditional" students-typically older than the rest of the student population-should not be considered in the proportions determining compliance with Title IX. According to the Women's Sports Foundation (WSF), those nontraditional students are more likely to be women.
Articles in several national newspapers on Friday claimed that the recommendations would not bring about drastic changes in the application of Title IX. Women's groups responded angrily to these reports, citing many possible harms that the recommendations could cause. One of their points of contention was what they saw as the ignorance of the panelists concerning many aspects of Title IX and its effects.
"While some have characterized the Title IX changes as minor and moderate, their true impact would be to devastate women's and girls' opportunities to participate in athletics and receive scholarships," said Marcia Greenberger, co-president of the National Women's Law Center, according to The New York Times.
The WSF has a host of objections to the commission's recommendations. The WSF believes that schools are still not in compliance with Title IX and that the composition of the Title IX Commission and the process of their consideration of the issues was biased against Title IX, according to an update released by the foundation.
Some students also have concerns with the commission's recommendations. "I don't think that the committee's plan for a survey or their plans for whom to count towards sports participation are practical solutions," said Katie Fitzgerald '06. "The solutions won't help men get their sports programs back and they won't help to increase interest in athletics among women."
Athletic Director Peter Gooding has been closely following the proceedings surrounding Title IX. "It doesn't mean as much at Amherst as at many larger schools. Amherst has always had a tradition of trying to provide equal support for women's sports ... Amherst is one of the few schools with more intercollegiate programs for women [14] than for men [13]," he said.
"It's not really a problem here," said Techo Kim '06, referring to equality in sports at the College.
Gooding cited the large rosters for football and men's lacrosse as causes for any disproportionality that exists at the College. "Few small colleges with football programs will ever have total equality ... Right now we're slightly underrepresented on the women's side," he said.
"Part of the reason some alumni donate is because of sports. Football brings in the money," said Byron Boneparth '06.
Gooding said that if a woman wanted to join the College's men's football team-which has never happened-the College would probably allow her to do so, while it would remain guided by "issues of safety."
"The success of Title IX has been absolutely magnificent," said Gooding. "It would be absolutely unacceptable to have anything less than equality."
One group that is unhappy with what they perceive is a decline in men's sports is the College Sports Council (CSC). According to its website, "The College Sports Council fully embraces the intent of the law as it was originally written. However, current regulations governing Title IX have created a quota system that arbitrarily limits participation in sports which harms men and does not benefit women."
The CSC cites the decline in men's athletic participation as a negative effect of Title IX. "In 2001, the NCAA had 580 more women's teams than men's teams," stated the website.
Also, since Title IX was passed in the Education Amendments of 1972, the quantity of men's programs in sports such as gymnastics, track and field and wrestling has dropped sharply. The same has been true of the number of male athletes per NCAA campus.
The CSC claims that more male participation in intercollegiate athletics is acceptable for various reasons "Participants in collegiate intramural sports, which are totally interest-driven, are about 78 percent male."
Gooding said that, in 1977, Amherst coaches drafted a statement expressing their goal of building an intercollegiate athletic program for women similar to that offered to men. This approach was in contrast to that of some other administrations around the country, which have "systematically reduced men's programs to achieve equality," said Gooding.