There's still hope! The National Association of Intercollegiate Athletics (NAIA) announced that athletes can only participate in women's sports if they were actually born female.
It's a wild concept, I know. 🙄
The Council of Presidents of the national small-college organization unanimously approved the policy, 20-0, following a December survey showing broad support for the decision (although five councilmembers did not show up to vote.) Previously, the association's policy only affected postseason competitions, but the new directive extends to all NAIA competitions.
NAIA president Jim Carr spoke to CBS Sports about the new policy:
We know there are a lot of different opinions out there. For us, we believed our first responsibility was to create fairness and competition in the NAIA.
...
We also think it aligns with the reasons Title IX was created. You're allowed to have separate but equal opportunities for women to compete.
The NAIA oversees 249 predominantly small colleges scattered around the country that aren't part of the National Collegiate Athletics Association's (NCAA) three competition divisions, and about 80% of these colleges are private.
This is good news, but the policy only applies to NAIA events, not NCAA.
For now! 🤞
Take a look at the complete policy that was released by NAIA earlier this week:
Student-athletes may participate in NAIA competition in accordance with the following conditions:
A. Participation by students in sports designated as male by the NAIA: All eligible NAIA student-athletes may participate in NAIA-sponsored male sports.
B. Participation by students in sports designated as female by the NAIA: Only NAIA student-athletes whose biological sex is female may participate in NAIA-sponsored female sports. They may participate under the following conditions:
- A student who has not begun any masculinizing hormone therapy may participate without limitation.
- A student who has begun masculinizing hormone therapy may participate in:a. All activities that are internal to the institution (does not include external competition), including workouts, practices, and team activities. Such participation is at the discretion of the NAIA member institution where the student is enrolled; and b. External competition that is not a countable contest as defined by the NAIA (per NAC Policy Article XXV, Section A, Item 12). Such participation is at the discretion of the NAIA member institution where the student is enrolled.
An NAIA institution that has a student-athlete who has begun masculinizing hormone therapy must notify the NAIA national office. The national office will take the necessary steps to provide appropriate privacy protections.
This policy will be subject to review in light of any legal, scientific, or medical developments.
The NAIA is thought to be the first national college governing body to require athletes to compete based on the gender they were assigned at birth.
Not only does NAIA's new policy exclude athletes who were born male, but it also prohibits women who have started male hormone therapy as part of their transition from competing.
Although NAIA is banning male athletes from competing against women, Carr wanted to make sure trans athletes know they can still compete against their own gender (men vs. men, women vs. women). Also, the policy doesn't apply to team activities like practices, exhibition games, and scrimmages.
It's important to know that the male sports are open to anyone.
This is all happening because of the 2022 Lia Thomas fiasco.
Since then, the NCAA announced it would let the national governing bodies for each sport call the shots on transgender policies. They mentioned that this new policy matches up with what the International Olympic Committee does.
Currently, the NCAA is in Phase 2 of a three-phase plan for transgender participation.
In a statement provided to CBS, the NCAA said:
College sports are the premier stage for women's sports in America, and the NCAA will continue to promote Title IX, make unprecedented investments in women's sports and ensure fair competition for all student-athletes in all NCAA championships.
Amy Novak, Council of Presidents chair and St. Ambrose University president, explained that a task force has been working for almost two years "reviewing research, meeting with experts to better understand potential policy challenges, and obtaining feedback from multiple membership groups."
With this policy, the NAIA has made its best effort to allow for the inclusion of transgender athletes in any way which does not impact the competitive fairness of women's sports. Our priority is to protect the integrity of women's athletics and allow them equal opportunity to succeed.
Pew Research shows only about 1.6% of the American population identifies are transgender, while about 5% of young adults between the ages of 18-29 identify as trans. According to Newsweek, privacy laws make it tricky to pinpoint the exact number of transgender athletes in school sports. Still, according to researcher and medical physicist Joanna Harper, the number likely doesn't exceed 100 nationwide.
I'm really not sure if an entire task force was needed to figure out if banning males from women's college sports was the right thing, but at least we're getting somewhere!
P.S. Now check out our latest video 👇
