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Opinion
Friday, March 3, 2000
Women's athletics still need equality
Kyle Ramsey/KANSAN
University needs to close gaps in coaches' salaries, other amenities
In 1972, Title IX, the federal law that mandates equality in academics and athletics, became a part of college life. It still commands a prominent position today.
Now, 28 years later, the University of Kansas Athletics Department still strives to fulfill not only the letter of the law, but the spirit of Title IX as well. It appears, however, that there is still some inconsistency with the equality the department claims to promote and its implementation.
According to University's Equity in Athletics Disclosure Act reports, coaches for men's teams are being paid an average of $80,871. Their counterparts on the women's side are being paid an average of $60,270. Assistant coaches on the men's side are paid an average of $53,290. The assistants for women's teams are being paid an average of $26,939. While these numbers are skewed by the salaries paid to assistant football coaches, there is still inequality.
It was not until 1994 that the department came up with a plan to become fully compliant with Title IX. The direct results of that plan are the existence of the women's rowing and soccer teams. However, it was not without some pressure that the University complied.
Following a complaint in 1992, the department began making the necessary changes to create equality between men's and women's athletic programs. The University and Bob Frederick, athletics director, do deserve credit. Both have made a concentrated effort to create the identity Title IX demands.
Within the last few years, the women's programs have benefited from this emphasis on women's athletics. A new locker room was built for the women's basketball team, and new softball and soccer stadiums for the respective women's programs are scheduled to be built within the next year. However, as 1992 and 1994 indicated, the athletics department still struggles to implement Title IX. The women's rowing team will be the last Top 25 team in the nation to have its own boathouse.
Frederick has preached equality for some
time now. It is nice to see him allocate funds and equipment to programs that deserve them.
This is a new day and age
in college athletics Yes, the men's basketball and football programs provided the majority of the $14.6 million that men's programs generated in revenue in 1998 and 1999. In contrast, the women's programs generated
programs generated
only $159 585 during the
But a lesson can be learned from other Big 12 Conference schools. Women's programs can generate money and excitement. This is a case where the more money spent equates with a better program. Examples of this are Nebraska and Texas's women's athletic programs.
only $153,535 during the same year.
more money on them women's programs and
the results are very evident. Each year, they produce several nationally ranked teams that generate more revenue than our women's teams do.
The University has made big strides thus
gaps in equity In this new era of women's athletics and the excitement and revenue
they can generate, the University has a great opportunity to build women's programs into teams that are ranked nationally on a perennial basis. It should be encouraged to do so.
Drew Ryun for the editorial board
Best schools are diverse; we're not among them
Our campus might seem very diverse at first sight. At least the University of Kansas wants us to think so. All the promotional material that it distributes to prospective students claims that our school provides a valuable education to students from all 50 states and from more than 100 countries around the world. The University is portrayed, therefore, as a very diverse institution. However, it is not.
International student enrollment in American colleges and universities increased by 5.1 percent for the 1997-98 school year, according to Open Doors, an
HAR REPORT published by the Institute of International Education, the leading non governmental agency in the international exchange of people and ideas. Total enrollment has reached 481,280, according to the report.
The institute affirms that the city with the most international students is New York City, with 29,855 enrolled in Fall 1998. The states with the most international students were California.
Cassio
Furtado
columnist
opiningkansan.com
New York, Massachusetts, Texas and Florida. While the international student community at other colleges in the United States is increasing, KU international student enrollment is experiencing just the opposite. It has decreased consistently since 1994. This should be a concern for the entire KU community.
According to data provided by KU International Student Services, the University officially has 1,477 international students this semester. That is about 5 percent of all students enrolled at the University. These numbers show a huge decline in the total number of international students enrolled at the University in previous years. The University had 1,526 international students in Fall 1998, 1,607 in 1997 and 2,067 in 1994, according to the Office of Institutional Research and Planning.
According to U.S. News and World Report,
international students comprise 9 percent of the student body at universities such as the University of California at Berkeley, the top public university in the United Sates. They also make up a large part of institutions such as the California Institute of Technology, Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Johns Hopkins University and University of Pennsylvania. And all of those universities are among the top 10 in the country, according to recent rankings also published by U.S. News and World Report.
Having students from abroad on campus is rich and complete because American students can interact with other cultures and beliefs without leaving the country. You can share experiences and concerns with international students about different aspects of academics and life. This allows for mutual growth that benefits more than just individuals. It enriches the University community as a whole.
By attracting more international students, the University also would create a source of more funds. According to the Open Doors report, more than three-quarters of universities receive most of their funding from sources outside of the United States. But our school needs to provide an environment that is more friendly to international students. Otherwise, they will continue to go to Berkeley or New York. This shouldn't be allowed to happen.
The University Senate's International Affairs Committee, of which I am a member, is trying to improve the conditions of international students by identifying their concerns and reporting those to the University Senate Executive Committee. But that alone is just the beginning because we cannot do anything to ensure that the committee's findings will be analyzed and enforced by the University. Administrators need to realize that international students are as important as the visits of Archbishop Desmond Tutu or the activist Rigoberta Menchú.
The University is doing a poor job recruiting international students. It is time to change that so that all KU students can get a better education.
Furtado is a Pelotas, Brazil, junior in journalism and political science.
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Flying the Confederate flag is offensive, should be banned
Most people are aware that the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People is protesting the display of the Confederate flag above the South Carolina capitol. Expect the protests to continue and eventually spread.
While South Carolina flies the Confederate flag along with its state flag and the U.S. flag, Georgia and Mississippi feature the Confederate flag as part of their state flags. I expect the NAACP protests to spread to Georgia. and
Georgia and
Allan
Davis
guest columnist
opinion@kansan.com
Mississippi.
But the Confederate flag is not just a southern issue. It is also an issue in Topeka, where the case that ended school segregation began.
Topeka has enacted a policy banning city employees' cars featuring racist or sexist symbols or messages from being parked
being parked at work sites or in employee parking lots.
The Confederate flag also became a national political issue in the South Carolina presidential primary, and both George W. Bush and John McCain ducked the question. Both said that the people of South Carolina should decide for themselves whether to fly the flag.
Bush took the stance that it was a local matter about cultural heritage rather than a national matter about race. He didn't want to talk about the flag.
According to a Sept. 7, CNN report, Bush said, "My advice is for people who don't live in South Carolina to butt out of the issue. The people of South Carolina can make that decision."
It's time for a little bit of "What would George and John do?" And that's George Washington. In 1860, would they have said that the people of the South could decide for themselves whether to have slaves? Would George have said abolitionists should butt out?
In the 1930s, would they have said that the people of Germany could make their own decisions as to what they could do with Jews? In the 1950s and 1960s, would they have said that the people of Mississippi and Alabama could decide if African Americans should be forced to sit in the back of the bus, attend separate schools, use separate bathrooms and separate drinking fountains and adhere to all the other segregationist ideas?
People might say, "Oh, but the flag is different — it's just a symbol, not an action."
That does not obscure the fact that displaying the Confederate flag is offensive. It brings to mind the defense of slavery and resistance to integration. It says to African Americans, "Remember the way things were? We don't like you, and we want you to know it." And it encourages some people to express themselves in offensive ways.
But be aware. African Americans remember the way things were. We are offended, and we want you to know it.
Occasionally, I see Confederate flag decals and license plates on passing
cars. That symbol puts me on my guard. Race is still an issue to some people, even here.
According to the same CNN report, supporters said that the flag represented Southern heritage and honored South Carolinians who died in the Civil War. To them, it's not an odious symbol of a shameful past.
Germany has the right idea about how to deal with the shameful past. It bans neo-Nazi organizations and arrest people. The Hitler era is every bit as offensive as slavery and segregation. Never mind that almost every German has a relative who died in World War II. Germans don't claim to honor their dead by displaying a symbol associated with Nazism. In Germany, it's extremely unpopular to display the swastika. Not many children anywhere are named Adolf, and almost no one wears a Hitler-style paintbrush moustache.
We need to deal with our shameful past in the same way. How can anyone actually be proud of slavery and those who fought to support slavery as an economic system? Sure, they were someone's ancestors and they are dead, but their mistakes should be acknowledged.
Nobody has the right to try to scare people with the memory of the past, a past when hooded Ku Klux Klanmen, descendants of Confederates, could lynch African Americans and expect to get away with it. Borrowing from the rock group Steely Dan, "Those days are gone forever — over a long time ago."
Davis is a Topeka graduate student in journalism.
Feedback
There is some degree of religion to our programming. However, we would never ask Student Senate to finance a program that would promote the religious facet of Judaism. KU Hillel provides an opportunity for Jewish students to find their Jewish identities on campus, just as the Asian-American Student Union provides a forum for Asian students to find their cultural identities on
Student Jewish group is cultural, not just religious
In response to the recent debate about funding for religious programs, I would like to state that the KU Hillel Foundation is as much a cultural organization as a religious one.
There is a clear distinction between what constitutes a religion and what comprises a culture. The Holocaust is a historical event that certainly is part of Jewish cultural history. A speaker that could tell his tale of going through the Holocaust allows for that part of our culture and world history to be taught firsthand to future generations so that this atrocity may never happen again. Providing Senate funding for a Holocaust survivor would be the same as providing money to the Black Student Union for a speaker about the life and legacy of Martin Luther King Jr.
campus, and any number of the other cultural groups on campus, for that matter.
The difference in this case, in my opin
KU Hillel did ask for support and assistance in bringing a speaker that changed the lives of hundreds of people who were in attendance and will continue to ask Senate for funding for programs that affect and reflect the culture and history of the Jewish people.
ion, is that the Intervarsity Christian Fellowship's plea for money in front of Senate came across using extremely religious tokens. As was noted in a letter last week, the speech delivered by the group clearly crossed the line between a legitimate claim for advancing academic thought and pushing religious ideals.
Seth Weisblatt Dallas, Texas, senior and KU Hillel Foundation member
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If you have general questions or comments, e-mail the page staff (opinion@kansan.com) or call 864-4924.
Broaden your mind: Today's quote
"He was sent, as usual, to a public school, where a little learning was painfully beaten into him, and from thence to the university, where it was carefully taken out of hira." — Thomas Love Peacock
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