By Catherine Johnson
SUNY Brockport is a college led by a female president, a college with a student ratio of 42% male to 58% female, and it’s a college with more women professors than men. On the surface, SUNY Brockport appears to be a shining example of gender equality, but if you look deeper, equity is a problem especially in sports.
With the 50-year anniversary of Title IX coming up this summer, looking closer at how Title IX is used and cared for at SUNY Brockport is vital to the college’s reputation. For female athletes Title IX is important for equity throughout male and female sports. Looking into how male and female athletes are treated throughout SUNY Brockport from both perspectives will show if there is equity within the Athletic Department or not.
With 10 men’s sports teams and 11 women’s sports teams there are hundreds of athletes competing to represent SUNY Brockport.
Shannon Blankenship a freshman on the women’s basketball team from Cleveland, Ohio brought up the discrepancies between the men’s and women’s basketball teams.
“The men’s basketball team has four assistant coaches and one head coach, for us we have two assistant coaches and one head coach.”
Inequity in coaching staffs is apparent in comparing softball to baseball as well. The baseball team has a head coach and four assistant coaches. The softball team has one head coach and one assistant coach.
Upgrades for football
In 2018 the football team at Brockport received a million dollar upgrade to their locker room.
In 2018 Brockport Athletics press release stated that the football team’s locker room would receive new lockers, new floors, football wrap around the whole room and a new paint job. With this renovation they’re hoping for an improvement on recruitment for the football program.
Women’s basketball, soccer, lacrosse, field hockey and volleyball received new locker rooms in 2018 as well.
Shannon Blankenship stated in regards to the basketball team “we are lucky to have a locker room like we do, it is great for recruiting and is decorated in our team’s core values.”
But for the softball and baseball teams they did not receive an upgrade in 2018 nor have they ever had locker rooms.
As of this year, the baseball team has been granted hooks and lockers for their equipment in the multipurpose room at Brockport. This room has batting cages used for both the baseball and softball teams, but the walls are decorated as Brockport Baseball only.
Softball player Julia Palopoli a graduate student in her 5th year with the program stated, “we have not been given a locker room at Brockport and happen to be the only team that does not have one as of now. It seems the athletic department is actively trying to find a ‘room’ or old ‘classroom’ for us to use as a team, but this is extremely unfair to us especially as a women’s team.”
As previously stated, the 50th anniversary of Title IX is coming up this summer, still 50 years later female athletes throughout the NCAA are fighting for equal representation among athletics. The NCAA has had 50 years to increase equality among male and female athletes, hopefully within the next 50 years across the board there will be equality.
