Phillip Whitten is trying to say that there were as much womens programs in swimming than men's programs in the 1970's and early 1980's. I disagree for one, many women that are just a few years older than me didn't swim in college. For starters top swimmers like Laurie Val in her early 50's didn't swim in colllege. There were a lot less programs for women than the male swimmers and only a few women got scholorships to swim in college. Also, I swam at the Community College level and a year before I started they just added 100 yard swims for women in back, fly and ***. They the California JR's still don't have the 200 yard distances but the women voted to keep the 50 distances instead. The male swimmers at the community college had two practices a day during their prime workout season while the women had one when I swam back in the 1970's. The male swimmers had state while the women's program added state after I left. I understand Mr Whitten being upset about elminating men's programs but that doesn't excuse him for changing history and stating that women had as many programs as the men did by 1981.
OK Cynthia, I read the article you were referring to. Sorry I didn't know it was there before. I've been playing catch-up since I got back from convention, and haven't checked in at SwimInfo.com for awhile.
The article doesn't actually say it was written by Phil Whitten, by the way. It doesn't have a byline that I could see. It looks to me like it may have been lifted straight from one of the wire services. And as Rob pointed out, the article doesn't take a position one way or another. It just reports the facts of the case.
I think you may have missed the point of the article, which was simply that decisions about the impact of budgets and Title IX are being based on bad numbers. That's it.
No one disputes the fact that women got a raw deal in the past, in terms of opportunity to compete at the collegiate level. But that doesn't mean it's right to cut men's programs today in order to comply with Title IX. Title IX was supposed to ADD women's programs, not cut men's programs. I am not familiar with statistics for all college teams, but I am familiar with the Southeastern Conference, and there are actually more women's programs in the SEC than there are men's. Alabama, Auburn, Florida, Georgia, Kentucky, LSU, South Carolina, and Tennessee have both men's and women's programs, but Arkansas has only a women's program. (Ole Miss, Mississippi State, and Vanderbilt have neither men's or women's programs.)
I believe from what I've read from Phil in SWIM Magazine that he is interested in preserving collegiate swimming, period. Men's and women's programs. He wants to counter the budgetary and Title IX excuses that college athletic directors are using to cut programs. You need accurate counts of the number of programs in order to make effective arguments, and the suit cited in the Sept. 16 article says that the count is NOT accurate. That's the only thing I get out of that article.
OK Cynthia, I read the article you were referring to. Sorry I didn't know it was there before. I've been playing catch-up since I got back from convention, and haven't checked in at SwimInfo.com for awhile.
The article doesn't actually say it was written by Phil Whitten, by the way. It doesn't have a byline that I could see. It looks to me like it may have been lifted straight from one of the wire services. And as Rob pointed out, the article doesn't take a position one way or another. It just reports the facts of the case.
I think you may have missed the point of the article, which was simply that decisions about the impact of budgets and Title IX are being based on bad numbers. That's it.
No one disputes the fact that women got a raw deal in the past, in terms of opportunity to compete at the collegiate level. But that doesn't mean it's right to cut men's programs today in order to comply with Title IX. Title IX was supposed to ADD women's programs, not cut men's programs. I am not familiar with statistics for all college teams, but I am familiar with the Southeastern Conference, and there are actually more women's programs in the SEC than there are men's. Alabama, Auburn, Florida, Georgia, Kentucky, LSU, South Carolina, and Tennessee have both men's and women's programs, but Arkansas has only a women's program. (Ole Miss, Mississippi State, and Vanderbilt have neither men's or women's programs.)
I believe from what I've read from Phil in SWIM Magazine that he is interested in preserving collegiate swimming, period. Men's and women's programs. He wants to counter the budgetary and Title IX excuses that college athletic directors are using to cut programs. You need accurate counts of the number of programs in order to make effective arguments, and the suit cited in the Sept. 16 article says that the count is NOT accurate. That's the only thing I get out of that article.
