The National Association of Intercollegiate Athletics, which is based in Kansas City, will allow athletes to compete in women’s sports only if they were assigned the female gender at birth, the national small-college organization announced Monday. The NAIA’s Council of Presidents approved the policy in a 20-0 vote after a survey indicated widespread support for the move.
The NAIA is a national athletic governing body for 249 mostly small colleges across the country that are not part of the NCAA’s three divisions of competition. The membership is 80 percent private schools, including many Christian colleges This decision does not apply to NCAA competitions.
“We know there are a lot of different opinions out there,” NAIA president Jim Carr told CBS Sports. “For us, we believed our first responsibility was to create fairness and competition in the NAIA.”
The NAIA is believed to be the first national college governing body to mandate that athletes compete according to assigned sex at birth. In addition to ruling out athletes who were assigned male at birth, the policy blocks those who were assigned female but have begun masculinizing hormone therapy to transition to women.
All NAIA athletes who are no longer eligible for women’s competition still can participate in men’s sports. “It’s important to know that the male sports are open to anyone,” Carr said.
The move comes at a time when transgender activist are breaking down protections for women’s sports across the nation. In 2022, Penn’s Lia Thomas became the only openly transgender athlete to win an NCAA Division I championship. In 2022, the NCAA announced it would allow the national governing bodies in each sport to determine transgender policies. The new policy aligns with that of the International Olympic Committee, according to the NCAA. The association is currently in phase two of a three-phase transgender participation policy.
Thousands of biological female athletes are pushing to keep constitutional protections for women’s sports by forbidding biological males to participate because they “identify” as women. They point to numerous instances of serious injuries to female players by larger and stronger transgender opponents.
“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,” the NCAA said in a statement provided to CBS Sports.
–Alan Goforth | Metro Voice