The NCAA Committee on Women’s Athletics has recommended that the Association remove equestrian from the list of emerging sports for women after 13 years in the program.
The committee made the recommendation to the Division I Leadership Council and the Division II Management Council based on the legislative requirements of the emerging sports program. Emerging sports must reach the championship sponsorship minimum of 40 schools within 10 years or show steady progress toward that mark. Equestrian hit the 10-year limit in 2012 and, despite remaining as an emerging sport for three extra years, the number of schools sponsoring it has stalled at 23.
In the spring, the committee, which is made up of 18 presidents, athletics administrators and student-athlete representatives from all three divisions, will have the opportunity to approve a legislative proposal to remove equestrian from the emerging sports list and forward it to the Divisions I and II governing bodies for final approval. If passed, the anticipated effective date is Aug. 1, 2017.
The emerging sports program began in 1994 to help schools provide more opportunities for female student-athletes. Sports in the program benefit from an expedited path to NCAA championship status, as the school sponsorship threshold is 10 fewer schools than the requirement for non-emerging sports.
After equestrian reached the 10-year mark as an emerging sport, the Committee on Women’s Athletics kept it on the emerging list because sport sponsorship was growing: Eight schools had added programs in the previous seven or eight years. But when progress stopped, with only 23 schools sponsoring equestrian in each of the last three years, the committee asked the National Collegiate Equestrian Association to present a plan for reaching the required 40 sponsoring schools.
However, even after reviewing the equestrian association’s strategic plan, the committee expressed concerns. The equestrian association’s two main strategies involved adding Division III and overcoming perceptions of high cost of sponsorship. Both were strategies the groups had been discussing for many years, committee members said.
“The group felt that it was our responsibility to focus our time and attention on the emerging sports that are truly showing growth, like sand volleyball and triathlon,” said the Committee on Women’s Athletics Chair Tim Hall, director of athletics at the University of Maryland, Baltimore County. “It certainly wasn’t anything against equestrian. It was a difficult decision for us.”
Read More: https://www.ncaa.org/about/resources/media-center/news/equestrian-recommended-removal-emerging-sports-list
