Title IX

From ESPN:

It's just 37 words, 37 plain and grammatically clunky words hiding inside a large education bill, 37 words that didn't seem to be a big deal at the time, 37 words that would change everything:

"No person in the United States shall, on the basis of sex, be excluded from participation in, be denied the benefits of, or be subjected to discrimination under any educational program or activity receiving Federal financial assistance."

Those are the words of Title IX, a section of the Education Amendments signed into law by President Richard M. Nixon on June 23, 1972. Not exactly "We hold these truths to be self-evident ... " but, then again, the Founding Fathers knew they were on to something back in 1776.

The Founding Mothers of Title IX were just looking for a more level playing field in academics. "We had no idea," says Bernice "Bunny" Sandler, who helped draft the legislation and now works as a senior scholar for the Women's Research and Education Institute in Washington, D.C. "We had no idea how bad the situation really was -- we didn't even use the word sex discrimination back then -- and we certainly had no sense of the revolution we were about to start."

You'll notice that not one of those 37 words is "athletics" or "sports," the very words that have come to be associated with Title IX. "The only thought I gave to sports when the bill was passed," Sandler says, "was, Oh, maybe now when a school holds its field day, there will be more activities for the girls."

They ended up having much more than a field day. The number of girls playing high school sports jumped from 294,015 in 1971-72 to 3,172,637 in 2009-10, an increase of 1079 percent. (The number of male high school athletes grew from 3,666,917 to 4,455,740 during that same period, an increase of 22 percent.) The number of women playing varsity sports in college rose from 29,972 in 1971-72 to 186,460 in 2009-10, a 622 percent increase that still leaves them behind the total of NCAA male athletes, whose population grew from 170,384 to 249,307 (46 percent) in that time frame.

Of course, the true significance of Title IX has been the accompanying increase in opportunities for women off the field -- a level of female empowerment so strong that Sandler calls the law "the most important step for gender equality since the 19th Amendment gave us the right to vote."

[...]

 From the ACLU Blog of Rights:

40 years ago, Title IX was enacted to ensure that young women and girls would be given equal access to education. Pregnant and parenting teens, however, are a group who are often denied the benefits of Title IX. Only 38 percent of teen mothers nationwide who give birth under the age of 18 earn a high school diploma by age 22. In a state like New Mexico, which has the second highest teen birth rate in the nation, this leaves thousands of young mothers with higher rates of unemployment, lower earning potential and decreased access to health care every year.

But what’s preventing teen parents from graduating?

Pregnant and parenting teens face many barriers to completing their education, including lack of childcare, financial challenges, school attendance policies that penalize teens struggling to take care of their own and their children’s health, and inflexible academic policies that prohibit them from making up missed classwork.

[...]

 From the Chronicle of Higher Education:

Nearly 200,000 female athletes will suit up this year on 9,274 NCAA teams. That's an average of 8.7 women's teams per college­—the highest number ever, according to a report to be released on Monday.

Although some sports have seen a decline in participation—including ones with high numbers of minority athletes—the overall numbers have grown markedly during the past two years. That is remarkable, considering the budget constraints many institutions have faced, say the report's authors, R. Vivian Acosta and Linda Jean Carpenter, professors emerita of Brooklyn College. They've been studying women's sports since the enactment of Title IX of the Education Amendments of 1972.

"This gives credence to the good will and understanding that if athletics belongs on campus, it belongs there because it has some connection to the educational mission—and if so, those opportunities should be open to both men and women," Ms. Carpenter said in an interview.

[...]

From the article:

Some believe the lack of women serving as athletic directors is about to change, with qualified women rising up the ranks. Others believe it would have changed already if not for qualified women — and men — who are happy occupying the No. 2 spot and who have no desire to take on the far more public role of athletic director.

Still others believe it's as simple as not having enough university presidents and chancellors willing to hire a woman to lead a major athletic department.

"I think it's a long journey that we've been taking for more than 40 years where half the population has said, 'Treat me fairly,'" said Chris Voelz, a former women's athletic administrator at the University of Minnesota and current leadership gifts officer at Women's Sports Foundation founded by Billie Jean King. "If we were to switch positions, would the men still be pleased with the position women have? To that end we have not arrived."
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