News
Quick Takes: Challenge to Data on Men's Sports, University to Sell More Eakins Works, Howard Bars Sudan Stocks, More Lender Scrutiny, Charges in N.J. Med School Case, No Confidence at Our Lady of the Lake, Indian Court Suspends Quota Additions
March 30, 2007
- A group that advocates for men's sports released data Thursday that it says show that many more men's teams have been eliminated than National Collegiate Athletic Association statistics typically suggest -- cuts the group blames on colleges' trying to carry out Title IX, the law barring sex discrimination. In its report, the College Sports Council argues that figures the NCAA and advocates for women's sports use to show that the number of men's teams and male athletes have stayed relatively constant or grown slightly over the last 15 years (while the number of women's teams and female athletes have soared) understate the level of cuts by failing to note how many more colleges have joined the NCAA over that time. In reality, “anyone that examines the data should be alarmed to see that schools have been cutting men’s teams across the board for years,” said Eric Pearson, chairman of the College Sports Council. He and other officials used the release of the report to argue for changes in how the Education Department enforces Title IX. NCAA officials did not respond to a request for comment, but the association report that contains the gender data notes clearly that "due to the increase in the number of NCAA member institutions, participation and sponsorship numbers may not accurately reflect expansion or contraction of participation opportunities at the institutional level. An increase may simply reflect the number of new institutions that joined the NCAA and sponsor teams for those sports."
- Thomas Jefferson University, which set off a huge controversy by selling one classic by Thomas Eakins, now plans to sell two more, The Philadelphia Inquirer reported. The sales come amid a national debate in the art world about whether colleges should ever sell off art.
- Howard University announced Thursday that its board had barred the institution from holding stocks in companies doing business in Sudan, where genocide is taking place in Darfur.
- Rep. George Miller (D-Calif.), chairman of the U.S. House Education and Labor Committee, on Thursday followed in the heels of New York Attorney General Andrew Cuomo and U.S. Sen. Edward M. Kennedy (D-Mass.) in sending sweeping requests to student loan providers, seeking information about their financial relationships with colleges. Miller sent his letters to Sallie Mae, Citibank/the Student Loan Corporation, Bank of America, Wells Fargo & Company, and JP Morgan Chase & Company.
- A New Jersey state senator and a former dean of osteopathic medicine at the University of Medicine and Dentistry of New Jersey were indicted Thursday in the broad corruption scandal that has engulfed the state's public medical institution. The indictment charges that the the former dean, R. Michael Gallagher, arranged a phony job for Bryant, who in exchange allegedly directed millions of dollars in state grants to the university.
- The faculty of Our Lady of the Lake University has voted no confidence in Tessa Martinez Pollack as president, citing enrollment declines and layoffs, The San Antonio Express-News reported. The faculty vote followed student protests over Pollack's leadership. The president declined to talk to the newspaper about the vote.
- India's Supreme Court on Thursday suspended a new law that would have expanded caste-based quotas designed to diversify enrollments in the country's top universities, The New York Times reported.
