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Springfield (Mass.) College, a school that has specialized in training coaches and physical education instructors since 1885, has long had a substantial program for women. Yet even there the men's swimming team has access to the pool for three hours each day; the women are allowed into the water for only one. So Deborah Kinney, a seven-time All-American distance swimmer, goes to the pool at 6 a.m. for an extra workout before beginning her day's studies. Says she: "An hour of practice isn't much use to a long-distance swimmer."
Whether fearing HEW or determined to right a wrong, schools across the nation are making substantial strides. At North Carolina State, the budget for women has risen from $20,000 to $300,000 in four years, and scholarships have increased from none to 49, including twelve for basketball, a fervent sport in the area. (Comparable figures for the men: a total budget of about $2 million, 180 scholarships for all sports.) U.C.L.A., long a leader in men's sports, is now winning women's championships. Next year U.C.L.A.'s women's budget will be $527,000 (vs. $3.7 million for the men). The Bruins' investment in women athletes is shrewdly placed. Women's basketball at U.C.L.A.—with a national championship team led by Ann Meyers—plays to crowds of three and four thousand, and gate receipts more than offset expenses. The pragmatic Meyers notes that national television coverage of their A.I.A.W. championship game last March well served the cause of women's sports. Says she: "What's important to U.C.L.A. is that it is getting coverage, regardless of whether it's men or women."
Like the men, the captains of Yale's varsity women's sports now pose for the traditional photograph perched on a section of fence salvaged from the Old Campus. Yale's athletic budget for women is more than $600,000, one of the largest in the nation. About 40% of the university's students are women, and they get some 30% of the funds. Yale's 19 men's teams have fallen on hard times recently: just eight teams had winning seasons this year. But Yale's sportswomen are doing splendidly: twelve of the 14 varsity teams had winning seasons. Success in sports has created confidence in Yale's women athletes. Says Senior Abbe Smith: "Athletics are really important for women at Yale. It's hard enough just being at a traditional male school, competing with men in the sciences and other areas that have traditionally dissuaded women from participating. Athletics is tied in. It has to do with self-esteem."
For all the hue and cry and hopes surrounding Title IX, the future of women in sport will be shaped not by regulations but by what is happening every day on fields and gym floors, where women and girls of all ages are discovering the joys of competition.