Speeches

40th Anniversary of Women in Athletics

Good evening. I am thrilled to be here tonight to celebrate not only the tremendous accomplishments over the last 40 years of women's intercollegiate athletics at Penn State, but the overall achievements of women -- as role models and leaders.

The last four decades have seen staggering changes for women in athletics, as well as in society. Consider this.

It was just 25 years ago that women couldn't get a bank loan without a male co-signer, and they were regularly discouraged from considering careers in chemistry, math, or engineering. Forty years ago, women were told they couldn't play rugby or ice hockey, and they weren't permitted to run more than 800 meters. Those sports were deemed by many as being too strenuous for female athletes to undertake.

Obviously, the rule makers had never heard of Mary Ellen Clark or Suzie McConnell, and hadn't even considered a Kathy Mills, Christie Welsh, Kelly Mazzante, Lauren Cacciamani, or an Olga Kalinovskaya.

These athletes have become synonymous with winning, synonymous with toughness, and synonymous with excellence. These women and many others set in motion massive changes that have brought female athletes onto the playing fields, ice rinks, courts, and pools across our nation.

Opportunities today abound for females, and I am proud to be able to say that Penn State was a pioneer in the movement to forward women's athletics in this country. As most of you know, eight years before the 1972 enactment of Title IX, Penn State launched its women's intercollegiate athletics program.

At a time when the rest of the nation was still debating equal opportunity for women, Penn State already had nine women's teams.  By the time Title IX legislation was enacted, Penn State offered one of the most extensive women's intercollegiate athletics programs in the nation with 11 sports.

Today, as you know, there are 14 women's varsity teams, more than two dozen club sports teams, and hundreds of women competing at University Park.

Over the years, research has borne out what we at Penn State seemed to have known before our counterparts. Women who participate in sports are healthier and more academically successful. Athletics promotes teamwork, leadership skills, discipline, perseverance, assertiveness, time management, decision making, and the courage to take risks.

As women continue to break through the glass ceiling, research shows that 82 percent of executive businesswomen played organized sports after elementary school.

We knew in 1964 that equal opportunities for women in athletics was something Penn State wanted to foster. While more remains to be done, we have much to be proud of and a great deal to celebrate on this 40^th anniversary of women in athletics at Penn State.

There was a time when the phrase, "You play like a girl" was considered an insult. As part of a racquetball duo where my partner is Fredina Ingold, whom many of you know is a former U.S. and world champion and the director of athletics for Penn State Altoona, I wish I played like a girl. While Fredina and I are the reigning Penn State co-ed intramural champions, it is Fredina who carries us.

For all of you pioneering women and men with us this evening, thank you for helping to ensure equality and opportunity in athletics and in higher education. To our female athletes, I wish to say "thank you" for sharing your exceptional talents with our University community and for helping to create a climate in which women can excel.