The women's volleyball team will be a full varsity team this fall, and the College's athletic department is getting ready to upgrade the women's softball team to varsity status next spring.
The College announced the two club teams would receive full funding within 18 months last February after the teams complained to the U.S. Department of Education's Office of Civil Rights about gender inequity.
The softball team will be an un-funded varsity sport next year, but will receive full varsity status in the fall of 1995.
Associate Athletic Director Josie Harper said it will cost between $90,000 and $110,000 to give the volleyball team varsity status. Harper headed a temporary committee to examine gender equity in sports teams at the College.
Harper said she expects the softball team to cost the same amount when it is fully funded.
Director of Athletics Dick Jaeger said the College will begin construction on a softball diamond with a price tag of more than $50,000 this fall at Sachem Field.
Funding for the teams came from "financial manipulation" within the athletic department and the Dean of the College office, Jaeger said.
Jaeger added that some long-term plans have been delayed because of the costs.
The athletic department is trying to counter the increased costs of two more varsity sports by shifting money from other areas and putting off plans they had in the works.
"It will be in the areas of travel, locker room improvement and the little things that you were going to do," he said. Now, those little things can not be done, he said.
He said there has been a team effort within the department to make cuts to fund the two teams and construct the softball field. But he said plans for advanced recruiting and increasing food money for traveling teams will be put on the back-burner.
Harper said funding the two sports is going "smoothly." She said the volleyball team's travel budget will be a little higher this year than in future years because the team has to travel to more schools because they were entering the Division I league.
As part of volleyball's move from club to varsity status, the College recently hired a full-time coach and is looking for an assistant coach. Anne-Marie Larese will coach the team.
The team also will receive funding for uniforms and travel, Harper said.
The search committee that selected Larese, formerly a coach at Bentley College, was created in the beginning of Summer term.
The committee was composed of administrators, coaches and students, Harper said.
The softball team will continue with its current part-time coach until a full-time coach can be found, Harper said.
She added that a search committee will be formed next summer.
Assistant Director of Facilities Planning Reed Bergwall, who is planning the team's field, said he does not know when it will be completed.
He said he is currently in the process of finishing the final plans so he can get estimates from fencing companies.
"The field is somewhere between a Cadillac and a Chevy," Harper said.
A federal investigation began April 1993 after the softball team complained that the College violated Title IX of the Educational Amendment of 1972.
Title IX prohibits institutions that receive federal funding from discriminating on the basis of gender in any of its programs or activities.
In the 26-page complaint, filed April 12, 1993, the softball team accused the College of giving baseball varsity status because it is "a men's team."
Though 48 percent of the Dartmouth student body is female, the complaint said only 43 percent of Dartmouth's athletes are women and 42 percent of the athletic budget is allocated to women's programs.
The upgrading of the two club sports to varsity status means there are now eight men's and eight women's varsity sports at the College.
The volleyball team later sent a letter to the Department of Education saying that it too had tried to get varsity status and alleged gender inequity.
In saying it would make the two club sports full varsity sports, the College headed off the on-going federal investigation.
Pelton said in an interview in The Dartmouth in February said his office would help fund the teams.
"We have always aimed at providing equitable athletic opportunities for men and women," he said. "The question has always been how do you do that and how do you pay for it."
Pelton could not be reached for further comment.
Volleyball Captain Candice Jimmerson '95 could not be reached for comment.
