Women Colleges and gymnastics teams

[mimi]

I got thinking today about how few colleges seem to offer gymnastics as an intercollegiate sport. Does anyone know why? It seems like practically every college has a soccer or basketball team. Also, do colleges ever start up new NCAA gymnastics teams? For example when I was in college a friend of mine went to Georgetown and played soccer. The team had only been started about two years previous. Just curious about all of this!

 

[htimcj]

I think there are two reason for colleges having or not having teams. First- gymnastics for most colleges are not money makers. No money=no team for a lot of places. Second reason is Title 9 ( I think that is the right number) there has to be a balance between men's and women's teams. But I am only speculating about that.

 

[Livychivy95]

I guess one reason could be there are like ten times as many basketball and soccer players than gymnasts. If as many schools offered gymnastics as they did basketball or soccer, there wouldn't be enough people to fill all the spots on the teams, which I'm sure in the end would lead back to the money issue and not making enough of it.

 

[Deleted member D3987]

historical point of reference. prior to 1978, women's gymnastics teams were all intercollegiate or what most know as intramural.

men had college and intramural teams.

title 9 changed all that.

 

[profmom]

Div 1 has limits on the number of scholarships that can be awarded and on athletes per team, and Title IX requires parity in team/scholarship offerings between male and female athletes. On the men's side, having a D1 football program consumes a huge quantity of those resources and the smaller, less visible men's sports lose out and are constantly under threat of elimination if the women's side shrinks at all or if budgets are being slashed. With only a very few exceptions, colleges and universities will go to extraordinary lengths to preserve football and often blame Title IX when they eliminate smaller men's teams to preserve it.

It appears to me that the biggest looming threat to women's NCAA gymnastics are the current controversies over considering cheerleading and dance to be sports. If they gain NCAA status and become scholarship sports, I predict that many schools will ditch gymnastics in favor of these sports that require less equipment and less highly professionalized training.

Please don't shoot the messenger (either about football or about cheerleading and dance).

 

[Granny Smith]

Lindenwood University just added gymnastics in the past few years (can't remember if it's 2 or 3 yrs old, their program). It is a D2 school.

 

[gymdog]

historical point of reference. prior to 1978, women's gymnastics teams were all intercollegiate or what most know as intramural.

men had college and intramural teams.

title 9 changed all that.

it is amazing that at its height, men's NCAA gymnastics had over 100 teams. Don't remember the exact # today and not sure about Temple's status going forward but it's closer to a dozen today and rapidly dwindling to almost nothing on the east coast (without Temple). Just Navy and W&M.

 

[Granny Smith]

Temple Men's will be continuing as a club sport, no longer varsity.

 

[gasrgoose]

I guess one reason could be there are like ten times as many basketball and soccer players than gymnasts. If as many schools offered gymnastics as they did basketball or soccer, there wouldn't be enough people to fill all the spots on the teams, which I'm sure in the end would lead back to the money issue and not making enough of it.

^^^^^^

From the USAG, in 2009 there were @ 69,000 gymnasts in the US, level 2 - Elite. If you considered high school gymnasts starting at level 6, which is kinda a stretch, there were around 30,000 high school gymnasts. This is a generous number considering many of these kids are much younger than high school. Even with a post Olympic boost from the 2012 successes there are probably still fewer then 35,000 high school age girls in the US participating in gymnastics including AAU and other organizations.

A 2014 article cited for the year 2012-2013 school year there were 971,000 (538,000 boys & 433,000 girls)in high school basketball and 782,000 (411,000 boys & 371,000) in high school soccer.

Gymnastics is a great sport with possibly the best athletes in the world, but it's just not that popular when considered against the other "big sports".

 

[1canadiangymmom]

^^^^^^

From the USAG, in 2009 there were @ 69,000 gymnasts in the US, level 2 - Elite. If you considered high school gymnasts starting at level 6, which is kinda a stretch, there were around 30,000 high school gymnasts. This is a generous number considering many of these kids are much younger than high school. Even with a post Olympic boost from the 2012 successes there are probably still fewer then 35,000 high school age girls in the US participating in gymnastics including AAU and other organizations.

A 2014 article cited for the year 2012-2013 school year there were 971,000 (538,000 boys & 433,000 girls)in high school basketball and 782,000 (411,000 boys & 371,000) in high school soccer.

Gymnastics is a great sport with possibly the best athletes in the world, but it's just not that popular when considered against the other "big sports".

This is a really great way to look at it.

 

[profmom]

It doesn't come down to money. Except for some very high profile D1 college football programs, collegiate sports do not make money. They are subsidized from the academic side when you take into account things beyond the obvious (i.e., coaches' salaries) and count things like stadium maintenance and NCAA-required student support services. I would be curious about comparative numbers for lacrosse, rugby, rowing, and field hockey, which are better comparator sports for gymnastics than very popular sports like baseball, football, basketball, soccer, and hockey.

I think that college sports can be a highly valuable piece of baccalaureate education if done properly -- with the recognition that a student-athlete is a student AND an athlete. And in this framework, running good sports programs that are more than just training for professional sports careers for a tiny handful of participants can be part of the legitimate agenda of an institution of higher education. The professionalization, commercialization, and monetization of college sports over the last 30 years has been far more destructive for athletes, universities, and the sports themselves than Title IX. And sports that have remained in that antiquated holistic life learning frame -- gymnastics being the poster sport -- have been the biggest losers.

[Steps off soapbox. Sorry for the rant!]

 

[gasrgoose]

It doesn't come down to money. Except for some very high profile D1 college football programs, collegiate sports do not make money. They are subsidized from the academic side when you take into account things beyond the obvious (i.e., coaches' salaries) and count things like stadium maintenance and NCAA-required student support services. I would be curious about comparative numbers for lacrosse, rugby, rowing, and field hockey, which are better comparator sports for gymnastics than very popular sports like baseball, football, basketball, soccer, and hockey.

I think that college sports can be a highly valuable piece of baccalaureate education if done properly -- with the recognition that a student-athlete is a student AND an athlete. And in this framework, running good sports programs that are more than just training for professional sports careers for a tiny handful of participants can be part of the legitimate agenda of an institution of higher education. The professionalization, commercialization, and monetization of college sports over the last 30 years has been far more destructive for athletes, universities, and the sports themselves than Title IX. And sports that have remained in that antiquated holistic life learning frame -- gymnastics being the poster sport -- have been the biggest losers.

[Steps off soapbox. Sorry for the rant!]

www.scholarshipstats.com

 

[profmom]

Fascinating. Though I find it sad that there are more than twice as many participants in men's bowling as for men's gymnastics. And note the way that football -- a single-gender sport -- sticks out dramatically.

 

[profmom]

Just for fun, look at this from the same site Gasrgoose linked to: http://www.scholarshipstats.com/varsityodds.html

Ladies and gentlemen, it is clearly time to transition our children to fencing.

 

[htimcj]

Ice hockey and lacrosse are good bets too

 

[ShesAMonkey]

Just for fun, look at this from the same site Gasrgoose linked to: http://www.scholarshipstats.com/varsityodds.html

Ladies and gentlemen, it is clearly time to transition our children to fencing.

Ha! That was exactly my thought. Hmm, I wonder if DD is too old to get involved in fencing?

Actually, my oldest DD has a friend who has transitioned from gymnastics to diving because it offers better prospects as far as college scholarships.

 

[Committed]

Ice hockey and lacrosse are good bets too

I keep trying to convince DD to go into women's golf! She even has her own set of pink clubs!

 

[3rd_time_around]

Temple Men's will be continuing as a club sport, no longer varsity.

http://gymnasticsnewsnetwork.com/bill-cosbys-stand-up-move-means-so-much-for-gymnastics/

 

[gymdog]

Temple Men's will be continuing as a club sport, no longer varsity.

Yeah but they raised like $60,000 though so I wasn't sure how that would/has affected it. Ultimately I guess the point is without it there are almost no more programs on the east coast.

 

[profmom]

it is amazing that at its height, men's NCAA gymnastics had over 100 teams. Don't remember the exact # today and not sure about Temple's status going forward but it's closer to a dozen today and rapidly dwindling to almost nothing on the east coast (without Temple). Just Navy and W&M.

And West Point!