Chambersburg, PA – The Wilson College athletics department has been granted a three-year waiver by the NCAA to comply with the sports sponsorship requirements for Division III membership. Institutions with enrollment of 1,000 students or fewer are required to sponsor five varsity sports, including at least three sports that involve all-male teams or mixed teams of males and females according to NCAA bylaws. Wilson already meets the sport sponsorship requirement for women and the waiver provides time for the college to meet the five-sport requirement for men.
"As Wilson College makes this transition to a coeducational institution, with careful planning, we requested that the NCAA consider a waiver for the sport sponsorship requirement and grant Wilson a period of three years to achieve compliance," said athletic director
Lori Frey.
Men's Division III sports programs debuted at Wilson this fall with cross country. Additional men's teams will include golf and basketball, set to begin the academic year of 2014, and soccer and volleyball starting in the academic year of 2015.
Head coaches for men's golf, cross country, and basketball are in place and recruitment of male student-athletes is underway. Searches for men's soccer and volleyball coaches will be conducted in spring of 2014.
"The athletics department is collaborating with many campus constituencies and departments to assure the best possible experience for our current female student-athletes and our new male-student athletes," Frey said.
Wilson currently offers six women's athletic teams: field hockey, soccer, cross country, basketball, lacrosse and softball.
The transition to coeducation began this fall after the Wilson College Board of Trustees approved a plan in January of 2013 to increase enrollment, strengthen Wilson's financial future and expand coeducation across all programs. Traditional male undergraduates began as commuter students at the college in August and, beginning in the fall of 2014, both men and women will enroll as residential students.
"Coeducation at Wilson is an important part of the college's future, and nowhere does the transition involve more moving parts than in athletics," said Barbara K. Mistick, president of Wilson College. "
Lori Frey, our director of intercollegiate athletics, and her staff have done a remarkable job in shepherding us through the NCAA process."
