NORMAN — U.S. District Judge Stefan Underhill ruled July 21 that Quinnipiac University in Connecticut could not replace its women’s volleyball team with a competitive cheering squad. His reasoning was that cheerleading doesn’t fit the qualifications to be treated as an official collegiate sport.
“Competitive cheer may, some time in the future, qualify as a sport under Title IX,” Judge Underhill wrote. “Today, however, the activity is still too underdeveloped and disorganized to be treated as offering genuine varsity athletic participation opportunities for students.”
According to Title IX, universities that receive federal funds must offer equal athletic opportunities to both sexes, a sport must have coaches, practices, and competitions during a defined season. It also has to contain a governing organization, and its primary goal must be to compete, not just support other teams.
Even though cheerleading has collegiate competitions and national championships, they do fall under the NCAA jurisdiction, such as other sports. But it does have several governing bodies such as the Universal Cheerleaders Association.
However, the brilliance of Underhill’s ruling is that proponents who believe cheerleading should be designated a sport are unintentionally calling for the death of other women’s sports. If Underhill had ruled the other way, Quinnipiac University would have done away with its volleyball team.
Five members of the women’s volleyball team had sued Quinnipiac after the university chose to cut their sport, along with men’s golf and men’s outdoor track, to save money. They alleged the decision violated Title IX. Underhill agreed.
“The University naturally is disappointed that the court has disallowed competitive cheer as a varsity sport,” Lynn Bushnell, vice president for public affairs at Quinnipiac, said in a statement. “We will continue to press for competitive cheer to become an officially-recognized varsity sport in the future.”
In other words, it’s cheaper to fund a cheerleading team than a volleyball squad.
When Underhill handed down his decision, I don’t think he realized the type of hornet’s nest he stirred up. Even though his ruling helped protect the core idea of Title IX , he set off a debate on whether cheerleading should actually be considered a sport and pitting various groups against each other.
The answer to whether cheerleading is a sport usually depends on how involved in cheerleading you are. For cheerleaders, parents and sponsors, its undoubtedly a sport. For the rest of us, it’s not that easy.
I agree that the actual work that goes into cheerleading is hard, dangerous and something most athletes in traditional sports could not do.
I go back to one of the prerequisites of Title IX: “Its primary goal must be to compete, not just support other teams.” Which group does cheerleading fall into?
I know cheer teams from youth through high school and onto college go to competitions throughout the year and compete against each other for various titles. But, I have always known cheerleaders to be a support group to the action on the field. While they are valuable, if done right, if there was no football or basketball games, there would be no place for cheerleaders to perform.
“I take seriously that the competitive cheer members consider themselves to be athletes and not entertainers,” Underhill wrote.
This may not sit well with diehard cheer enthusiasts, but I think they are both athletes and entertainers. And there is nothing wrong with that. But to call what they do a sport is a leap I’m not willing to take just yet.
