M.I.T. drops pistol team

[1776 Rebel]

In an economic environment that is hitting the college endowments pretty hard guess what teams are getting dropped? Well shooting of course. MIT in Mass. has one of the best and most active college pistol teams in the nation believe it or not. So the powers that be are dropping the pistol team from varsity. That is a big loss.

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/04/25/education/25mit.html?hpw

NY TIMES
April 25, 2009
To Save Money, M.I.T. Drops 8 Sports Teams
By CATE DOTY
High school students with dreams of competing in alpine skiing at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, beware: when this academic year ends, the institute will no longer have a varsity team.

That squad and seven others — competitive pistol, golf, wrestling, and men and women’s ice hockey and gymnastics — were eliminated on Thursday by M.I.T.’s athletics department, citing the need to trim $1.5 million from its budget.

The announcement ended several weeks of meetings and student hand-wringing over which of M.I.T.’s 41 Division III varsity teams would be cut. Being an innovative lot, M.I.T. students looked for ways to save programs, including fund-raising and protests. Some disgruntled students even kidnapped Tim the Beaver, the institute’s mascot, demanding that all 41 teams be kept. (The student playing Tim was released unharmed, although the costume’s head eventually ended up on the John Harvard statue in Harvard Yard.)

“These programs contribute to our ever-precious admissions yield, which in turn contributes to our esteemed public perception and high national ranking,” Ethan Solomon, a second-year student, wrote in an opinion article for The Tech, M.I.T.’s student newspaper. “Indirectly, these factors may influence alumni donation rates, which further influence our national ranking.”

The institute said, however, that even in flush times, the 41 teams weighed heavily on the department, and that the cuts were intended to strengthen the remaining 33 squads.

Some of the eliminated programs, like the pistol team, may become club sports, said Will Hart, the pistol coach.

“We’ve been a varsity club since 1937, so this is something entirely new for us,” Mr. Hart said of the pistol program, one of the top-ranked in the country and one of the institute’s most popular physical education classes.

“M.I.T. has a certain culture,” he added. “The students need release. I hope they find something else that was as close to enjoyable as their sport was.”[/b]

http://web.mit.edu/pistol/www/

[ericire12]

They cut it for "economic reasons".... Yeah right! You never want to waste a good crisis, do ya?

[TAB]

They had a pistol team...


I recently read a artical about people that gruadated from MIT and the econ.  60% of the gradutes could not find employment 6 months after they got out of school.

[tombogan03884]

I'm surprised they had one to begin with. After all, the first word in MIT is Massachusetts.

[twyacht]

What's next, Harvard cutting Legal Debate Teams?

We'll see...

[Sponsor]

[tombogan03884]

What's next, Harvard cutting Legal Debate Teams?

We'll see...

NEVER !  But the rowing team may get the axe.

[TAB]

rowing is not a sport... its what happends when your motor brakes.   

[1776 Rebel]

If a team like MIT which produces national and international champions can be cut, all bets are off. I am sure that Scholastic Clays etc will all feel the pressure. No farm team no champions. No student interest now, no 2A supporters within the next generation.

[Timothy]

no 2A supporters within the next generation.

My kid is our hope....and remember, there are 900,000 licensed gun owners in MA, nearly 20 percent of the populous.  As Tom stated before, the eastern 1/4 of the state is communist, the rest of the state is pretty conservative!  Our biggest problem is the 2 million communists in and around Boston rule!

[TAB]

My kid is our hope....and remember, there are 900,000 licensed gun owners in MA, nearly 20 percent of the populous.  As Tom stated before, the eastern 1/4 of the state is communist, the rest of the state is pretty conservative!  Our biggest problem is the 2 million communists in and around Boston rule!

sounds alot like CA... 90% of the land mass is conservative, if it was not for LA and the bay area this would be a very conservative state.