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Adding sports?

By Erin Buzuvis, Sudha Setty, and Kristine Newhall

Columbus State University in Georgia seems to be throwing caution to the wind and adding sports despite these troubled economic times. The DII institution does not have a football program which might mean the school has a little more budgetary freedom. If so, it's using it to add four more sports. FOUR! Men's and women's track/field (not sure if it's both indoor/outdoor; they already have cross-country), women's golf, and co-ed rifle are the lucky winners at CSU.

The school currently fields 8 sports, including a tennis team that has both men and women. I have never seen this particular situation before because usually the seasons are different for men and women, though often times teams will use the same coaching staffs.
No word on the size of the new teams but currently CSU has an undergrad population comprised of 61 percent women with women receiving 52 percent of athletic opportunities. Though with the addition of sports CSU can certainly argue continuing expansion of programs and might satisfy prong three as well; it is possible that some of these sports were club sports that had requested varsity status.

The school is, apparently, all about expansion. They are planning a new state-of-the-art recreation center and just announced that, by the way, the facility with have an aquatic (also state-of-the-art, of course!). Lest you think that administrators are just going wild with the plans and the spending, it was the student government association that approved the addition of the aquatic facility; many of the costs associated with the new facility are being funded by student fees.

Interestingly, the new facility will have a women's-only workout space. Wonder how that will play out...

Full post as published by Title IX Blog on December 15, 2008 (boomark / email).