Status of Gymnastics (summer '02)

10 Facts about Women’s Collegiate Gymnastics

Two questions to keep in mind.

The facts are overlooked when evaluating interest in gymnastics.

USA Gymnastics (USAG)[1] estimates that there are over 3 million children participating in gymnastics in this country.  Over the last 3 years, the 16 NCAA Division III schools that sponsor gymnastics have received an average of 300 applications per year from gymnasts interested in joining their teams[2].  This would render 20 extra teams with 15 gymnasts each of just first-year students. The student run Collegiate Club National Championships had 192 female gymnasts competing in 2002 representing 30 different colleges and universities, so there is proven interest and commitment to continue with the sport in the current student population as well.

Yet administrators at the colleges that dropped the sport last year claim that gymnastics is dying.  Instead of keeping the opportunities alive for their well deserving students they are precipitating the sport's demise by discontinuing their programs or, in three out of the four cases, asking the athletes to come up with better than $4 million to keep their program alive.  This is a sport where most families have already spent a considerable amount of money in putting their daughters through private gymnastics schools for 10 to 12 years.  Fundraising for registration fees, judges fees and travel to regional and national competitions is something that these families are asked and expected to do in club gymnastics.  Now, universities are starting to ask the same thing just so that these athletes have the opportunity to finish out their careers in college.  Gymnastics will become a difficult sport to sponsor as many teams are already forced to travel to neighboring states to find competition.  And, as conference sponsorship decreases, it places the other programs in the conference in peril.

Why have the numbers gone down?

Gymnastics is a sport that requires ever-changing, high performance and expensive equipment as well as highly technical coaching to ensure safety.  Because of that, many high schools in this country have been forced to discontinue the sport.  Even states such as Utah, Alabama and Florida have chosen to cut their programs entirely.  The disappearance of gymnastics programs in some states and high schools has forced the gymnasts to move to different sports such as track and field and diving.  There is a direct relationship between the reduction in opportunities to participate in high school gymnastics and the increase in Competitive Spirit Squads, which the National Federation of High Schools 2001 Participation Report[3] shows as 88,561 members strong.  It could be conservatively estimated that 10 percent of these athletes would be doing gymnastics if they had the opportunity to do so in high school.  Interest in participation is a key indicator used by colleges and universities to either add or discontinue a sport.  While the number of high school teams and participation has declined so have the opportunities to continue in college (view table). The fact that USA Gymnastics statistics1 show an increase in athlete membership of 54 percent over the last 10 years and that the number of private gymnastics clubs has increased by 37.5 percent over the last 5 years has not seemed to matter. Over the last ten years, the number of teams - and therefore opportunities for athletes - has increased in major NCAA female sports by an average of 117 percent[4].  Gymnastics is the only sport for which opportunities have decreased - by more than 10 percent over the last 10 years and an astonishing 50 percent since 1981. (view table)

Why does everyone seem to get the same score? – Long time Dedication and Commitment.

The 2002 National Rankings[5] show that 63% of qualifying all-around competitors in all Divisions of the NCAA averaged better than a 38.0 as a sum of the four gymnastics apparatus.  Overall, over 66% of all qualifying scores for all individual events averaged better than a 9.5.   To the uneducated fan, these numbers may seem a little bit outrageous, but consider the following: 98% of all NCAA gymnasts (Division I, II and III) come from the USA Gymnastics Junior Olympic program’s highest levels (9, 10 and elite). The NCAA includes former Olympians and national team members from countries such as Canada, Brazil, Spain, Russia, Norway, China and the US. All of these athletes average a total of 12 years of gymnastics experience prior to getting to college.  Furthermore, during all 4 of their high school years, these athletes average 25 hours per week of gymnastics practice for 50 weeks out of the year.  No other sport can claim that the vast majority of their athletes come to college with 5000 hours of training under their belts during high school.  It is a fact that female gymnasts can attain world-class status during their late teens, just look at the USA’s 1996 and 2000 Olympic teams.  The reason why scores are so high for the majority of the athletes is because they truly deserve them and the lack of opportunities means that there are virtually no roster spots available for your ‘average’ gymnast.

Most important: Academics

Given the proven dedication and commitment that gymnasts exhibit in their sport, it is no surprise that they excel in the classroom as well.  Graduation rates for gymnasts exceed 90 percent[6].  In 2000 and 2001, an average of better than 35 percent of gymnasts[7] had a 3.5 or better cumulative GPA.

The National Collegiate Gymnastics Association (NCGA)[8] awards all-scholastic recognition to the seniors who finish their academic career with a 3.0 or better.  In 2002, the NCGA recognized 76.6 percent of their seniors with this award.   It would be nearly impossible to compare all-scholastic awardees from sport to sport, but the statistics are not hard to find for two of the NCAA’s most prestigious awards, the Post-Graduate Scholarship and the Woman of the Year Finalist recognition.  In a per capita comparison over the last 5 year period (1997-2001), gymnastics comes out on top in both categories.  For the Post-Graduate Scholarship, gymnasts have received the recognition at a rate of 1.69 better than the second place sport of swimming and diving, and 2.42 times better than third place basketball (view table).

The difference is greater in the Woman of the Year Finalist Award[9], which recognizes an even more select group of athletes. Only one athlete per state makes the initial cut of 51 state winners, and 10 finalists are chosen from that group.  Over the last 5 years, gymnasts have been named Finalists at a rate nearly 3 times more often than the second place sport of field hockey and 3.62 times better than third place basketball (view table).

Lastly, the same type of comparison in what is now known as the CoSIDA Verizon Academic All-American Award.  This is a recognition that is voted on by the Sports Information Directors all around the country and it is commonly accepted as the highest academic award given to an athlete.  Prior to 2002, only the sports of Softball, Basketball and Volleyball had a specific allotment of awards, so those sports are not included in the table.  The data for the last three years, which is available at the CoSIDA official website[10], shows that gymnasts have received this award per capita in second place, only behind the sport of alpine skiing (Table 5).

A final word

The hope of this study is to present the facts to college administrators so that more universities will follow the lead of the University of Arkansas, Fayetteville, which is sponsoring a team starting in the 2002-2003 season.  The evidence is clear that there is not only a huge demand for college gymnastics opportunities by very deserving student-athletes, but that the colleges will be rewarded by these exceptional young women.  Administrators are urged to refocus on their mission statements and realize that gymnasts personify the mission academically, athletically and in the manner in which they represent the university.  These student-athletes are winners in every sense of the word, and it should be plain to see that opportunities for them should be increasing rather than being taken away or asking them to pay their own way.  

NCAA Woman of the Year Finalists

NCAA Post-Graduate Scholarships for women